If your opinion trumps the Bible, how can it be debated?

[Willum]

So very many debates on this forum are completely muddied by one person arguing the Bible, and the other arguing opinion or belief.
The ironic bit, is it usually the non-Judeo-Christian arguing the Bible and the religious arguing the opinion.

How does this happen? Well the non-religious can only go by what the Bible says, the religious have a hodge-podge of of interpretations and opinions that make some portion of the Bible viable over the bits they don't.

This brings up a couple of questions:
1. I don't like lots of laws of physics, for example, but I don't go around pretending vehemently that there is a switch somewhere where I can go turn it off, nor should a Jew or Christian simply be able to ignore what the unpleasant parts of their religion, based on opinion.
Am I wrong?

2. If ones own opinion about religion trumps what is written in a book you believe is the truth, then you don't believe it is true.
Am I wrong?

3. How can other debaters be expected to debate the religious persons' personal opinion about the Bible, vs what the Bible says?

[JP Cusick]

So very many debates on this forum are completely muddied by one person arguing the Bible, and the other arguing opinion or belief.

How can other debaters be expected to debate the religious persons' personal opinion about the Bible, vs what the Bible says?

It is because opinions matter - and the only true debate is between opinions.

In this hateful world people degrade and insult opinions as worthless or meaningless which is the hate filled rule of power (brute force).

People in high positions of power get their opinions to matter and even have their opinions as the rule of law, and every other person is subordinate and their opinions are crushed or discarded as inferior.

A bucking horse is giving its opinion by trying to buck the rider off of its back - but people are stronger than the horse so the human opinion is more powerful and the horse must submit to the greater force.

The opinion of a Judge in Court can matter a lot, and a Legislature or Congressperson's opinion matters, and a child's opinion can not really challenge the parent(s)' opinion unless the parent(s) concede to their child.

The Bible is based on opinion because it can have different translations and interpretations, and each person brings a different point of view.

It is also the case for any discussion then each person needs to give their own opinion in order for the discussion to function, and giving respect to each other's opinion makes for a healthy discussion, and trying to deny the opinion of others as just opinion is a power play to dominate the other opinion with thy own opinion.

Virtually everything any person says is their opinion, and so to fight the power then people try to claim that their own words are the truth and are the facts and are not opinions, because they are trying to fight the oppressive powers which try to hold us all down.

Using the truth as the common denominator is the solution, but that can only be done when each person values the truth over their own opinion, and then the two or more people must come to agreement as to what is the truth and what is not, and even then their truth becomes their shared opinion.

The quest to find the absolute truths has never been satisfied.

All of our opinions matter - and any person trying to suppress our opinion is thereby trying to dominate us - and ignorant opinions from ignorant people really do need to be suppressed.

[marco]

nor should a Jew or Christian simply be able to ignore what the unpleasant parts of their religion, based on opinion.

Well, to be fair, they don't ignore - they "interpret." God ordering the murder of Isaac was a trial, a practical joke, an illustration, a hint towards Jesus, the sacrificial lamb... anything but an evil command. Only the Biblically uninformed would see the command as wicked.

If ones own opinion about religion trumps what is written in a book you believe is the truth, then you don't believe it is true.
Am I wrong?

It is not possible for a true believer to possess an opinion that trumps Scripture. If they are tempted so to think, they pray or ask advice of an elder. Those of us who think our opinion is better than biblical, are hopelessly deceived and will be disabused of our errors at the Judgment where we gnash our teeth.

How can other debaters be expected to debate the religious persons' personal opinion about the Bible, vs what the Bible says?

One can do this easily by quoting the text and giving a correct interpretation. The opinion voiced by some Christian minority will be flawed in some way. Cherchez la flaw! Of course this won't change the opinion of one's adversary but it will fill one with warmth and satisfaction. Amen.

[ttruscott]

Well the non-religious can only go by what the Bible says,

To equate the non-religious as only "going by what the Bible says", while religious must interpret what is written is, prima facie, fallacious. The non-religious interpret what the bible says as much as everyone else and also they conclude that they know what it all means better than the religious.

We all know what GOD says, we are just all trying to understand what it all means! To declare that only your group follows "what is written" without interpretation is nearsighted and doing what you accuse the religious of doing. It is no more acceptable to apply this perception of erudition to the non-religious as it is for any religious group to espouse this perfection of knowledge for themselves.

[Provoker]

[Replying to post 1 by Willum]Hi Willum:
I used to argue using verses until I realized that it was one of the things common to all doctrinally disagreeing denominations.
Presumably, the books of the bible were each written to stand alone, and simply selected in order to form the bible. That means to me that there is probably a lot of stuff in the bible, which is not really pertinent to the greater story. Information like "Jehu drove his chariot furiously" do not seem to have any doctrinal value. However, when it comes to establishing doctrine, any verse, from anywhere in the bible, is exploitable by a denomination.
In order to avoid what I see now as the "verse trap", I simply looked for a story which ran with continuity through the whole bible. The story I found made so much common sense that I could never go back to arguing verses again. I get accused of making up a story, but that is quite logical because those who depend on the convenient wording of verses, are just not capable of seeing the story.
Every verse based doctrine is someone's opinion based on how he interpreted the verses. All the doctrinally disagreeing denominations are opinion based!!! Everything anyone believes about the bible is simply opinion, because all have the same scripture.
So how can opinions be debated? Not with verses because that does not work. People have been debating Christianity for centuries, with the same old arguments, and the same old verses, and the number of denominations just keeps on growing.
I learned all the stories of the bible when I was a child in Sunday school, but it wasn't until I was in my 60s, that I learned the bible story which made me realize that I have been led down the garden path by people who did not know any better.
The bible story it took me 60 years to learn, is the story of God's everlasting gospel promise to Abraham, around 2000 BC. Abraham believed God and was justified by faith. The faith was named after Abraham, and those who believed the faith of Abraham were call Abraham's children.
When I realized the Jesus and Paul both preached the gospel which God preached first to Abraham, it changed everything. Now I can see that every issue in the bible, can, and must, be understood in the context of the gospel of God, Abraham, Jesus, and Paul.
All my opinions regarding the bible, are based completely on God's everlasting gospel promise to Abraham, and the very clear story of how men have dealt with God's gospel over the centuries. Probably the most important opinion I have is that the church which began at Nicaea in 325 AD, is completely pagan. It is diametrically opposed to the gospel of God, Abraham, Jesus and Paul. God's gospel has been covered up since the 4th century, and it was never a religion. It was the end of religion(pagan) for those who believed it.

[Willum]

[Replying to post 4 by ttruscott]

In order to argue the Bible, non-Jews and non-Christians must accept what the Bible says about itself, prima facia, it is the only thing a non-believer can do.

If something is obscure, all we can do is try to get what it means from context language, or previous interpretation.

If what it says is in plain sentence structure, then we accept that. We have to, we don't have a contrary opinion to what it says about itself.

Now we can see that the Bible said the world stood still. A non-believer acknowledges that is what it says, and points out that that is impossible. A believer acknowledges what it says and believes it, or says it needs to be interpreted etc..

Now, very many Bible-supporters on this forum pick and choose and have interpretations of text that do not seem anywhere near what the Bible says, even contradict it, and do not even seem to be aware of WHAT the Bible says. (As an aside - you use scripture well.)

and these are what the OP is about, the non-Jews and non-Christians having to muddle through irregular interpretations.
V/R

[Willum]

[Replying to post 5 by Provoker]

I am not sure how to reply:
How is your method different from "taking everything out of context," so that you can take the pieces and make any argument you like?

How can one have opinions about what you claim is the truth - like I used as an example, I can't just go to the wall and switch off gravity because I don't like it - you religious folks are talking about truths supposedly related to something even deeper, how can you religious just say, "I don'tlike it, so I don't believe it?"

Just because the truth is ugly or inconvenient, you don't just get to go to the wall and turn it off.

[Provoker]

Just because the truth is ugly or inconvenient, you don't just get to go to the wall and turn it off.

Hi Willum:
Exactly:-) Just for the heck of it, think about the difference between pagan religions, and God's gospel promise to Abraham, and see if you can understand why the faith of Abraham would be considered "good news".
Then you can think about the difference between God's gospel promise to Abraham, and the priest defined Judeo Christian religions, and see if you can figure out where the good news went...LOL

[EBA]

So very many debates on this forum are completely muddied by one person arguing the Bible, and the other arguing opinion or belief.
The ironic bit, is it usually the non-Judeo-Christian arguing the Bible and the religious arguing the opinion.

You noticed that too? Good for you.

How does this happen? Well the non-religious can only go by what the Bible says, the religious have a hodge-podge of of interpretations and opinions that make some portion of the Bible viable over the bits they don't.

Yeah, that's because most believe they have Holy Spirit which magically makes them understand everything in scripture.

This brings up a couple of questions:
1. I don't like lots of laws of physics, for example, but I don't go around pretending vehemently that there is a switch somewhere where I can go turn it off, nor should a Jew or Christian simply be able to ignore what the unpleasant parts of their religion, based on opinion.
Am I wrong?

Nope, you are absolutely right.

2. If ones own opinion about religion trumps what is written in a book you believe is the truth, then you don't believe it is true.
Am I wrong?

Nope, right again.

3. How can other debaters be expected to debate the religious persons' personal opinion about the Bible, vs what the Bible says?

Most atheists will make Christians look foolish simply because both parties take scripture literally.

Peace.

[JehovahsWitness]

Presumably, the books of the bible were each written to stand alone, and simply selected in order to form the bible. That means to me that there is probably a lot of stuff in the bible, which is not really pertinent to the greater story.

The path to biblical truth (after recognizing that such a thing can exist) is to seek internal harmony with ALL the verses and settle on the interpretation that best reflects this. This we (Jehovah's Witnesses) refer to as "letting the bible interpret itself" .


JEHOVAHS WITNESS