oh for god's sake. dan, don't be so obtuse.

you made universal statements about what "christians" believe. i was simply pointing out that my friends, who regard themselves as christians, don't satisfy your criteria.

i don't care who calls themselves "christian". it's your club, their club, not mine. but maybe you can stop with the silly universals.

Trav, I'm unsure how using verbatim quotes could fail in "accurately describing the views of others".

>>Your satire would be more enjoyable, Pericles, if you were accurately describing the views of others. Those two quotes you just posted actually have nothing to do with literal or non literal.<<

It certainly appeared to me that Sells was advocating a non-literal interpretation when he advised that "...the resurrection of Jesus Christ is not an event that may be observed and examined so as to come to a conclusion about its reality or not"

Surely, if you were to form a view that the description of biblical events is allegorical, that would firmly preclude a literal interpretation.

Dan was heading in much the same direction with his "in ways we don't comprehend". Presumably, if they are beyond our understanding, that automatically rules out any literal interpretation.

Or perhaps we differ on the definition of "literal interpretation"? In my language, that means "it happened exactly as it was written".

>>Paul said it best when he commented that if Jesus didn't rise from the dead, our faith is in vain<<

Yep. But as I understand it, both Sells and Dan are giving you permission to believe, but not to question too deeply. Which is a fair enough description of having faith, I guess.

Here's Dan again.

>>Fashionable or non-fashionable, nobody takes or ever took the Gospels in a strictly literal manner.<<

Nobody? Ever?

Are you really sure about that, Dan?

http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=43957

"...most Americans – 63 percent – believe the Bible is literally true and the Word of God."

That's from 2005. This century. This decade, in fact.

Fortunately they have people like Sells and yourself to put them right, don't they.

fractelle, I asked for quotes where I'd "demanded" that you "believe my beliefs", or where I was "forcing my beliefs on you", which was your original accusation against me. I also said I wouldn't bother replying anymore if you keep making accusations like that.

Since then, all you've done is post two quotes where I previously asked you to justify the SAME accusation. So, it's been established that you can't justify your claim, and we both know why that is- there are no quotes, because I never "forced my beliefs" on you at all. You're just talking bullocks, and childish bullocks at that. Therefore, I think it's best if I ignore you from now on, as I previously suggested might be the case. I'm only interested in discussing with people who want to have a rational discussion. And I'm definitely NOT interested in discussing anything with those who only want to continually repeat personal accusations against me without any justification. My time's too valuable to waste on that.

Now, back to the topic at hand!

Pericles, mass generalisations do not help anyone. No one takes the whole bible literally or the whole bible metaphorically. The debate is over which bits are literal and which bits are metaphorical. The gospels are clearly literal- their genre is hellenistic biography to be more precise- and Dan agreed when he said: "The death and resurrection of Jesus, being the central focus of the four Gospels, can in no way be interpreted as allegory or myth, at least not within the clear intention of the authors."

I absolutely agree, Trav.

>>Pericles, mass generalisations do not help anyone<<

So let's both try to avoid them, shall we?

>>No one takes the whole bible literally or the whole bible metaphorically. <<

Dear me. It looks as though we have fallen at the first fence.

Almost any sentence you can think of that starts "No-one does this or that" is going to finish up as a generalization.

No matter, let's forge ahead.

>>The gospels are clearly literal<<

Oh. How do I put this?

Trav, this just isn't going to work out. But please - it's not you, it's me.

Water into wine. Distance healing. "Rise, take up thy bed, and walk". Fishing in Gennesaret. "Commandeth he even the unclean spirits, and they do obey him". Mass healing in Capernaum. That leper. That guy with palsy. That shrivelled hand. Lazarus... the list goes on.

http://www.answering-islam.org/Campbell/app_a.html

http://musicbysunset.com/Miracles%20with%20Parallel%20Gospel%20Accounts.htm

Now, can I just ask whether these are the stories that you would like us to accept as "clearly literal?".

The first of these links actually "counts" the number of witnesses who were there at the time. Cute.

But we were talking of the resurrection.

To quote my favourite atheist, "It is interesting that there are no accounts of the resurrection in the Bible. No one saw what happened in the darkness of the tomb on the third day."

Oh, sorry. That was Peter Sellick.

So it would appear that we are left with an extremely bizarre position. To an atheist, anyway.

The central theme of Christianity - "the death and resurrection of Jesus, being the central focus of the four Gospels" which, as Dan tells us, "can in no way be interpreted as allegory or myth", actually has no narrative support in those same Gospels.

The good part of that, of course Trav, is that because it doesn't appear in the Gospels, you don't have to decide whether to take it literally or not.

Handy, I'd say.

Pericles, I'm going to make some more of those mass generalisations that I warned against. How hypocritical of me. I'm going to assume you're a footy fan. So consider this. You're watching the game. Nick Riewoldt takes a spectacular mark from 20m out, dead in front of goal. He walks back and prepares to take a short run up. He starts running toward goal, begins the kicking motion, drops the ball into midair....but you blink. You miss the moment of contact! As your eyes open, you see the ball sail through the goals.

Question: In this imaginary scenario, did you see Nick Riewoldt kick a goal?

Using your logic, I guess not!

Bushbasher,
When discussing the merit of Christian beliefs, it is appropriate to first establish exactly what Christians believe.

I generalise without hesitation or reservation that standard Christian belief is that Jesus was more than an ordinary man, and that he rose from the dead. For thousands of years, Catholics, Orthodox, and more recently Protestant Christians and even JWs refer to Jesus as the Son of God and Risen Saviour.

These beliefs are found throughout the New Testament. If your friends, who have theological degrees, deny all such Biblical teaching, I would say they are rather unusual Christians, but more likely you’re mishearing them. Perhaps you should let them speak for themselves.

Trav,
I agree with your analogy.

Pericles seems to say that since no witness saw the body come to life in the cool of the tomb, then it probably didn’t happen. This is a bit like saying since no one was outside of the Apollo spacecraft in the coldness of space watching it on its way back from the moon, then that was probably a hoax. Or maybe since no one saw me put the garbage out in the cool of this morning then that couldn’t have happened either.

Pericles’ mystifying argument probably arises from a misunderstanding of what Sells was saying (not surprising, as Sells is pretty hard to discipher).

Pericles,
Scripture, in fact all literature, from reading the back of the corn flakes packet to higher forms, must be interpreted. Fairly often the literal view is not the intended meaning.

Surveys also must be interpreted. When 63% of Americans claim that the Bible is literally true, I don’t think that they're referring to all of it. When Jesus calls James and John ‘Sons of Thunder’, do they believe that lightening and thunder got married and had children? For the parable of the Good Samaritan, few believe that there was actually a man taking a trip down the road, was attacked by robbers and rescued by a Samaritan. It is clear when Jesus was teaching using parables.

However, I think you’re intelligent enough to understand these distinctions.