How can I help religious DD?

[IsabellaofFrance]

My DD is 6.

She has become increasingly more religious in the last year. She attends Rainbows and Sunday School (at her request) and she loves both.

I think she understands that beliefs are individual and that not everyone believes the things she does, and she is happy to share her own beliefs. She has started to get interested in Dinosaurs and Space, and became really upset when learning about the creation of the universe as it doesn't fit with what she believes.

DH is Atheist, I am Christian but only attend Church semi-regularly and I just don't know how to handle it. I can't answer the questions she has without upsetting her. She is bright and articulate so its not explaining it on a level that is the problem, its knowing what to say.

Biblical scholars have known for years that the three synoptic gospels share much of the same material. The disciplines of source criticism and redaction criticism within biblical studies research the use that the writers of Matthew, Mark and Luke made of each other and of other sources (such as a lost compilation of the sayings of Jesus, or of the disputed, lost, Q source), and of the ways in which they treat the same material differently. It's uncontroversial stuff -- for example see the summaries in Wenham and Walton, Exploring the New Testament, a comprehensive textbook by two leading (Christian) New Testament scholars.

So, on the one hand, BigDorrit is right that there is plenty of repeated material between the synoptic gospels (Matt., Mark, Luke). On the other hand, this is not big news. Biblical scholars have been studying the sources of the gospels since the nineteteenth century. More recently, the eminent scholar Richard Bauckham has published compelling arguments that the gospels should indeed be understood as eyewitness testimony, supporting featherandblack's point.

So, both of you have valid points

As an academic I'm very keen on citing sources . But that was a bit of a needless dig.

Big You were asked to cite your source for one of the two claims you made because you rolled it out like it was indisputable. If you're going to say something dismissive about religion to someone who practices it, you should have the manners to back it up. I tried to check the context with you before addressing the point - but you seemed to feel that it was my place to simply try and change your mind. When you finally did come up a source, you did so with the proviso that you didn't want to discuss it with me - so you cited merely to have the last word. Fair enough. If you'd had the decency to engage reasonably, my response would have been the same as niminy's.

It's immediately apparent on reading the synoptic gospels (it would not take two years of research) that there are many points of similarity. These are probably not accounts that have been composed by four different individuals, in isolation, straight after the events described, Perhaps 'eye witness accounts' is a misleading term if that is what it conjures up. However, despite the similarities, the gospels each come from a different perspective culturally and that comes over very clearly in the differences from one gospel to another. They are not cookie-cutter at all, as they would be if they were dreamed up by one individual or close-knit group.

It would be interesting to look at how a group of individuals put together their individual narratives of any big event over a period of years. How much can we ever expect an eye-witness account to describe any event with complete accuracy, especially other accounts have also been read and an aural tradition has grown up around the stories.

I don't agree that Mark reads 'like fiction' but I know what you mean. It's as if the writer is coming from a background in that genre. However, the references are not fictional at all; they're historical and religious so 'reads like fiction' is over-stating it.

There's a good book (not perfect but worth reading) that goes into some of this. It's called The Case for Christ by a writer called Lee Strobel.

I would start with Wenham and Walton, Exploring the New Testament vol 1, The Gospels and Acts. It's clear, based on really up to date scholarly research, presents opposing arguments clearly and fairly, and has good bibliographies for further research.

The problem with believing the veracity of such an old text with nothing to verify it is that one runs into intellectual difficulty when dismissing the claims of other old texts, or anything else that someone says is true with nothing to back it up. If I say 'wow, loads of people are really convinced by the bible and the witnesses therein so I reckon it's true' I've then got to say the same about the Koran otherwise I'm effectively having double standards. They can't both be true but they can both be false.

If it's so necessary to have these extra study guides in order to swallow the bible's claims wouldn't a wise God have dictated them to someone at the same time as the the others? Also how come it's possible for someone to study the origins of the bible at HE level for a life time and still see it as man made and a depiction of a culture's need to create a deity for social purposes and yet another person who knows nothing of the origins can totally 'buy' it? I've known long standing Christians on these boards to have mistakenly believed that the gospels were actually written by the disciples!!

If someone is truly searching for clarity in relation to the veracity of the Bible, I cannot understand why they wouldn't balance secular academic reading with biblical scholarly work. Richard Bauckham is a very gifted and thoughtful academic who deserves a hearing in this dialogue.

It might be surprising to find the degree to which these scholars follow where the evidence leads them, rather than to a foregone conclusion that they 'want' to believe. For a Christian, the most challenging aspect of entering Christian academic work is the setting aside of foregone conclusions and beliefs. You leave a world where all Christian writing is the inspired word of God in favour of a place where errors, insertions, translation issues and theories, cultural meanings are painstakingly examined. Personally, I found it difficult at first but as my understanding of the Bible grew, my respect for the text also grew. If the Bible is worth reading, it should be able to bear the weight of scholarly analysis.

If you read the book of Revelation as a biblical scholar, for example, you would find that every word in every line builds on much older texts in the old testament as well as speaking directly to the cultural and political issues facing contemporary readers. Each book works individually in its cultural context but there are also overarching themes that span the whole collection of manuscripts which were written over many lifetimes. I remember reading through many of the more obscure books in the old testament for the first time and being amazed that the god of the old testament - who I had thought of as utterly ruthless and tyrannical - is actually the driving force against social injustice in the Jewish community. At a time when heathen religions practiced child sacrifice, sexual abuse of children and other obscene practices, the Jewish community was being threatened with dire punishments if they failed to uphold a very high standard of social justice and protection for refugees, children, the poor and vulnerable women.

At the end of the day, we are talking about manuscripts that are ancient and the work of people, inspired by God or not. They were compiled in a variety of cultural contexts over many years by people who are unknown to us and certainly fallible. There was a selection process reflecting what was important to those compiling it, there was transcribing of aural accounts and songs, there are obvious errors though not as many as you would expect in a work of this kind. Many people who have studied this have found it compelling and chosen to believe that it is a collaboration. Many haven't. The Bible itself tells readers to go away and do the research and make their own minds up.

You don't have to believe the Koran and the Bible alan. They are different.

Quite a lot there to disentangle, so I'm going to put it in numbered points.

re: AlanPacino's posts:

1. Your equation between the Bible and the Koran is a false syllogism (the Bible is thought to be true; the Bible is an old text; the Koran is an old text, therefore the Koran must be thought to be true). You are also silently conflating two quite different ideas about what it means for a text to be true: one is whether it is an accurate account of historical events judged by the documentary standards we accept as normal today, and the other is whether it tells truths about the nature of the world that arise from but are not confined to the particular historical time of its composition.

1. Ancient and medieval history depends on the understanding and interpretation of very old texts, often available only as fragments or as quotations or references in other texts, supplemented, where available, by archaeological remains (which also need interpretation). There is much in ancient history that is only substantiated through one text. The Bible is unique in having such a complete textual history. And, of course, the Bible is a collection of diverse writings made for different purposes and by different peoples over some hundreds of years, and it is in itself an important source of historical evidence.

1. Your distinction between people who 'buy' the Bible and those who see it 'as a culture's depiction of a deity for social purposes' is a false dichotomy. It is, of course, possible to believe that the Bible contains the central truths of our existence and to know that it is a collection of writings by human beings trying to understand the revelation of God. Churches can and should do more to educate Christians about the Bible, and learning more about it, in my view, is no threat to faith.

re: BigDorrit's post

1. As I understand it, Bauckham and others propose an earlier date for Mark, arguing that what have been seen as the references to the destruction of the Temple are in fact references to earlier rebellions by the Jews against Roman occupation. Bauckham argues that the writer of Mark was in fact a companion of Peter and that it represents a distillation of the memories of Peter.

1. Textual history of the Gospels shows the texts to have achieved their final form extremely early and the unusually large number of early manuscripts show very little variation. There's no evidence to back up your contention that the final text of the gospel bears little resemblance to what was originally written - indeed, the large amount of similarities and correspondences between the three synoptic gospels is in itself evidence that after the period of composition they have remained the same.

1. I agree with you about apologetics. I find the same with Richard Dawkins.

"If the Bible is worth reading, it should be able to bear the weight of scholarly analysis. "

This. Absolutely. And it is, on both counts.

Your response to niminy's point 2 is interesting, big. Where there are many different copies of a text at different moments in history, and in different translations too, there will be differences. These will range from straightforward errors to differences in nuances to, now and again, passages where there are reals grounds for ambiguity about the meaning. There will also be insertions, as you've pointed out. But there also likely to be many areas of consensus across the texts - an unambiguous core of meaning if you like. Why would you wish to dismiss this?

Also, you are a bit out-of-date in making a case for the gospels not being directly authored by each apostle. With the exception of Bauckham's recent arguments, it is not widely argued that they were.

I'm not ready to dismiss areas that don't agree. If you will tell me an area of difference that you think is particularly telling, I have no problem thinking about it very carefully.

If you're asking me why I don't feel these areas of difference are proof that the bible is simply a flawed, fallible collection of fables that have nothing to do with any real god, that's a whole different question.

I don't need you to do any research for me, thanks Obviously you aren't actually aware of any of these differences or you would have had a few to point to.

You actually strike me as someone who has read 'secular apologetics' with emphasis on the conclusions and not much independent or balanced thinking about the rationale. That is exactly what you're accusing Christians of doing when they swallow Christian apologetics without weighing it up and doing their own research. The 'research' you do mention seem to be based on google, perhaps with a bit of dawkins, and not much else. Certainly not an up to date understanding of contemporary biblical scholarship, which is basically what you're up against if you're peddling these arguments. Your approach seems to be more 'I'm a skeptic, it's your job to convince me - trot out your biblical knowledge and I'll regurgitate the conclusions I've read which contain those key words to tell you why you are wrong.'

You seem to assume that what you've read will be superior simply because it's secular but this is really not the case. All research has a context and a starting point, religious or not. There is a world of difference between contemporary biblical scholarship and how people like Dawkins would like you to picture it. If you're serious about attacking the validity of the bible, I think you need to know more about it. Otherwise you're just spouting someone else's theories without knowing much about those theories either.

you don't have to believe the bible and Koran

I do if I want to apply the same set of decision making on one as the other. Otherwise I am in a position where I'm being dishonest with myself which I would find unsatisfactory.

who I had thought of as utterly ruthless and tyrannical

And you were a Christian at that point?