Pericles.. the 'cat' is simply some insights which have thus far been missed by all.

I'll bounce it off you this way. "If.. you only had the Gospel of Mark, and you have read the first verse. .. how much would you know about Jesus? and what would you make of the word 'Christ'? keep in mind, Mark was writing for a Gentile audience (though that's kinda cheating to mention that).. but even forgetting that external information, we are left with the 'meaning' of.. "Jesus..Christ".. grappling with this issue will shed a lot of light on the way Mark has structured his record. You might ask also 'where in his gospel is the word Christ used, and in what context?"
"What does this tell us about his structure and purpose, or about his audience "?

Why does he use the world 'Gospel'.. you could (in your most capable way) look this up.. aah.. information :) do you see why Mark used 'that' particular word?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_news_%28Christianity%29

Why didn't he just say 'story'..'report'.. 'account'? 'euangelion' had technical and historical meaning.

Again..this is not about 'is the text authentic or reliable' in the historical sense.

If you get nothing else out of this, at least you 'should' get the fact that I look at things rather closely when it comes to religious issues.

BUGSY.. how about having a go at Mark 1:1-4? at least try to give something along the lines I gave you for Darwin?

OLY.. I had a look at Nero, I don't really see any connection to Mark 1:1

One Under God.. try to relax a bit mate.. the topic is really not about most of those things you mentioned. What is your particular tradition or denomination or faith please?

c

Boaz,

Mark 1.1-1.4 & Nero

I put there are similarities between the exchange between the Nero & the Armenian King and Jesus & John the Baptist. The Emperor is greater than the King. A known high status person is supplicating himself before a person of even higher status.

Please look again and comment.

Mark:

I assume you require that the text be read, as if today, with no special knowledge of meaning or antiquity or other languages.

[No using dictionaries. Assuming no foreknowledge of uncommon vocabulary.]

The passages seem disjointed in time. The flashback is confusing,

Mark 1.1: Opens as if a fairy tail or fantasy, “Once upon a time….”, “In a Galaxy Far, Far, Away..|.” It does suggest a genesis-style of story, a beginning of the story. Perhaps something like: This is the commencement of a story about, Ares the Son of Zeus.

[Had Mark been a better writter he may have commenced; "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the spring of hope and the winter of dispair," [Dickens],

Mark 1.2-3: [disjointed, flashback]: A guide will come from the desert. Prepare the way for the [unidentified] Lord.

Mark 1.4: Baptising [what ever that means?] is performed by a person called John the Baptist, seeming a specialist in the craft of Bapting to make straight paths for this Lord from the desert. Maybe a Bapt is tool to make paths straight. People whom Bapt are forgiven their sins. Presumably, a sin is something one needs to be forgiven. A Bapt is a magical tool.

O.

topic is 'How to Interpret Texts- Religious and Secular'

i have stated at other times i am a thiest[I_love_god/creation[reading all the texts from gods many messengers]

So back to understanding texts

know we are given this gift of life/Spirit dwells within the Body

man is a spirit,
the body serves him for the performance in the world,
that the spirit is man's internal and the body his external

it-is the same with text.

http://www.swedenborg.org/odb/sermon_detail.cfm?sermonID=2496

The s/word in the scriptures is either truth or falsity used as a weapon.

Swedenborg tells us that when a man persistently refuses to live
according to a truth that he knows,...

http://www.swedenborgdigitallibrary.org/comp/comp480to560.htm

'providence leads man by his affections [love] not by thought'

'the particular type of 'love' leading us to the good or evil by deivine providence'[love/logus]

We are created so that we can choose to serve ourselves, and so risk become evil, because freedom to choose moraly is what makes us human and not animals.

We were made in the image of God and must be able to choose freely what we will love and learn to do.

BUT There would be no virtue or happiness in doing right if we could do nothing else.

Thus We are given freedom of choice [and mens texts to judge us should we go wrong].

comprehend how it is with respect to the spirit of man , his body and his texts
therefore
assert that the spirit dwells thus within the body,
and the body,as it were, incloses and invests it's power [spirit].

But it should be known, that the spirit within the body is in the whole Our choice ,
according as we love to see it.

a life of satisfying only our senses,
with no thought of whether we are doing right or wrong or whether we are substituting our natural pleasures for God,[a greater good].

Our choice could be for a beautiful, satisfying life serving the Lord and our neighbor.

God stands before us with his arms open, waiting for us.
but The choice is ours! Ahh -men

There truly is no end to your preening narcissism, is there Boaz?

>>Pericles.. the 'cat' is simply some insights which have thus far been missed by all.<<

How can that be? The combined intellects ranged here have failed to grasp some "insights". Well, shame on us, is all I can say.

>>I'll bounce it off you this way. "If.. you only had the Gospel of Mark, and you have read the first verse. .. how much would you know about Jesus?<<

Not a great deal. They are words without context.

Some of the context rests with the author (as I am sure you would agree, for your own reasons), some with the circumstances of the writing (with notes; with assistance; with personal knowledge of the events under discussion).

Without some understanding of these, the deconstruction of your text is pointless. As I said, just words.

But, in order to indulge you, here goes.

As requested, just the first verse.

"The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ"

Beginning: yep, got that.

Gospel: more difficult. But apparently from the Greek evangelion, via Old English, indicating "good news brought by an evangelist." So, colours have been firmly nailed to the mast here. This is not going to be a factual, unbiased account, but a spin-laden narrative designed to influence you towards whatever-it-is that the evangelist is selling.

Jesus Christ: presumably the subject matter. So, nothing illuminating except that the subject at least has a name.

How am I doing so far?

Note: according to some scholars, "the Son of God" was added later. Once again, underlining the need to be aware of the context.

OK, I've played your game, now you can play mine.

Where do I find one line of third-party evidence that any of the startling events in the life of Jesus actually occurred?

Without that, you can hardly consider the Gospels factual, can you?

Cont'd from last post:

Boaz, thus, I put it to you the questions I asked are indeed important questions and I'd be interested to know your answers.

I 'honestly think' you have devoted much of your life to the importance of religious texts, and as such you would not like to confront the fact that there is not a certain way to interpret them all - that the reason why there are so many offshoots of Christianity, is because each of these groups have rejected a single interpretation and fashioned another - because a concrete interpretation does not exist - and that is just the situation within the religion, not outside. Thus, I think it would be very unpleasant for you to confront this reality as it would invalidate the foundations upon which you have built your life and your world view.

Pericles points out the situation - given the vast majority of your discussions on OLO come back to attempting to persuade people that your concept of god is the correct one and you have a better handle on how to 'interpret' these texts than any others, would it not be reasonable to place this thread in context as an attempt to position yourself as placing a higher opinion and higher value on your ability to interpret a text than others, and would it not seem in keeping with the context of your other posts, that it does appear to be very much like a 'Trojan horse' to get others to consider the bible and come around to your way of thinking, disguised as a neutral essay on different (or in your eyes, singular) means of interpreting texts?

Regardless of your 'just consider the text' I don't believe this is a neutral exercise without ulterior motives and I don't think the source authors are relevant.

If genuinely discussing interpretation, I think my shuttle questions are far more relevant and probing in discussing these concepts, and they don't have the added baggage of appearing to be a stealthy attempt to consolidate a position which would increase your effectiveness at proselytising.

I agree that we need to comprehend the cultural bias of any text to be able to interpret it. Within that statement, we alson need to comprehend what cultural bias is, and how cultural bias is often defined by religious obligations. Therefore, only when we understand every of the religious obligations embedded in any religious text, will we be able to interpret it.

Meanwhile, interpreting secular texts, is just too easy by comparison, and it is worth noting, that people trained to interpret religious texts are more thorough than anybody else when it comes to interpreting secular texts.

There is one fundamental rule of every religion, without which no interpretation of any text is possible: that is to use your conscience.

Thereby religous reading is taught using our feelings to guide us into comprehending meaning. The difference is that feelings/emotions are taught as a human function which ought not have any negative expression, yet which is always beneficial to be attentive to. The basic lesson is that, when we avoid manifesting negative feeling contributions to the world, we live longer.

Read for longevity by conscience rather than conscious thought, and you will have mastered interpretative analysis. (Tafsir is the Arabic word for "interpretative analysis of scriptures")