I know you don't know

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kcplusdc@yahoo.com
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I know you don't know

Post #1

Post by kcplusdc@yahoo.com »

A simple bible search will pull up a number of verses, in both the new and old testament that basically state God is unknowable.
His ways are not are ways, and the ussual parade of verses confirm the idea of God being outside our ability to quantify.
In fact it may be impossible to know any creature completely.
For example I can study ants my whole life yet still will never know them fully.
Further more it is important to point out that ants and man live on a level playing field, both exist and are subject to the rules of this universe.
God does not play by these rules.
Therefore it can logically be assumed that knowability would be even harder to achieve with God as he is not subject to the laws of universe and exists outside of time.

Having established the above idea how does one view the bible? Can it be viewed as a typical book? How do you take directions from someone who says you won't be able to understand them? How do you know that you are understanding Gods word correctly or missing the mark?

Surely one can not start a conversation with the idea that God is unknowable and then continue with this is what he wants from you?

As a believer how do you approach these concepts and what if any effects does it have on your understanding of the bible.

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Re: I know you don't know

Post #2

Post by Divine Insight »

kcplusdc@yahoo.com wrote: As a believer how do you approach these concepts and what if any effects does it have on your understanding of the bible.
As a believer, I accepted that while I cannot know God, God can certainly know me well enough to communicate with me effectively. In fact it was my believe that God is infinitely intelligent and perfect, and therefore could not possible miscommunication with me. After all, since God is the omnipotent omniscient being any miscommunication between myself and God can only be God's fault. How could it possibly be my fault when I wouldn't be able to know when miscommunication took place. Only God could know this.

So, as a believer, I saw absolutely no excuse at all, for the Bible to be confusing, or appear self-contradictory in any way. So I set out to study the Bible to learn clearly what God has intended for me to know. I had even been taught that the Bible contains answers to all our questions. So from that perspective there should be no reason why any of my questions concerning the Bible should go unanswered.
kcplusdc@yahoo.com wrote: Having established the above idea how does one view the bible? Can it be viewed as a typical book? How do you take directions from someone who says you won't be able to understand them? How do you know that you are understanding Gods word correctly or missing the mark?
As a believer, I set out to study the Bible with the sincere intend to understand God's directions for me, and for all of humanity.

What I quickly discovered is that the more I read the Bible the more self-contradictory it become. Instead of finding answers to my questions all I found was more unanswered questions.

Not only this, but I was also taught as a believer, that the "Holy Spirit" will guide me via my feelings, etc. And that I would simply know when I am on the right track, or the wrong track based on who I am feeling about things. (i.e. pay attention to my conscience). If I'm feeling good about something that's the Holy Spirit telling me I'm on the right track, if something isn't making sense and it doesn't feel right to me, then that's the Holy Spirit telling me that I'm on the wrong track.

Well, ironically, the more I read the Bible the more 'wrong' it felt. Nothing was making sense. It was contradicting it's own claims and premises constantly. And I found myself in grave disagreement with many of the behaviors, and directives attributed to this God.

Moreover, when I started to consider that the entire thing might not be anything more than a very poorly written mythology written by men who had grossly lesser moral values than myself, I actually felt quite good about having made that insight.

So if there exists a Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit was telling me that the Bible is nothing more than poorly written mythology that attributed some of mankind's worst attributed to the fictitious God they are claiming to speak for in the Bible.

I finally came way from this experience being absolutely certain that the Bible does not reflect the directives, or intelligence of any God.

I didn't even become an atheist at that time. At that time I was still a "believer", I still believed that a God exists. I simply no longer believed that Hebrew mythology has anything to do with God, and most certainly isn't God's instructions to humans.
kcplusdc@yahoo.com wrote: Surely one can not start a conversation with the idea that God is unknowable and then continue with this is what he wants from you?
I totally agree with this. Biblical Apologetics is dead as far as I'm concerned. It's impossible to defend, or attempt to support the Bible in any serious way. The only way to try to keep the Bible alive is to make precisely the kind of contradictory claims you suggest. You would need to claim to not know God, yet supposedly be able to understand precisely what he wants from you, etc.

It's not a defensible theology, IMHO.

The Bible cannot be true as it is written. Even Biblical Apologists are keenly aware of this. This is why they refuse to talk about a 'literal' Bible and consistently hide behind the excuse that they need to re-interpret it into something totally opposite from what it literally has to say.

In fact, some of them even use the Holy Spirit thingy as their excuse for doing this. In other words, for them the Bible doesn't make sense either, but their own personal reinterpretation of things into something totally different from what the Bible actually says makes them feel good. So they attribute that to meaning that the Holy Spirit is confirming to them that their opinions are God's opinions, and the authors of the Bible are the ones who got everything all wrong.

And for many apologists this is all they need to convince themselves that their personal view of what they wish the Bible had actually said is in harmony with God.

So ironically they stand there with the Bible in hand proclaiming that it doesn't mean what it actually says, but instead they will tell us what they think it ought to have said. And they'll cherry pick verses that seem to vaguely support their views whilst brushing any verses that appear to be in conflict with their view under the carpet as having been misguided views of the authors of the very book they are claiming to be "God's Word".

Apparently they cannot see the folly of their own methods. I was fortunate enough to recognize that this can never be made to work in any rational or meaningful way. The apologists have actually proven the fallacy of their own methods by not being able to come to any meaningful consensus between themselves. All apologists ultimately disagree with each other on more than they agree on. Thus revealing the fact that they have nothing meaningful to stand on. They can't even convince each other. The myriad of disagreeing sects and demoninations of the religions that have resulted from these texts speaks for itself. None of these people can agree on much of anything, for if they could they wouldn't be so strongly opposing one another.

The fallacy of the Bible is the only thing that is obvious about the Bible.
[center]Image
Spiritual Growth - A person's continual assessment
of how well they believe they are doing
relative to what they believe a personal God expects of them.
[/center]

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tam
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Re: I know you don't know

Post #3

Post by tam »

Peace to you all,
kcplusdc@yahoo.com wrote: A simple bible search will pull up a number of verses, in both the new and old testament that basically state God is unknowable.
And what of these:


“I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you had known ME, you would know My Father as well. From now on you do know Him and have seen Him.�
John 14:6-7

"All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son AND those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him." Matthew 11:27


Christ does not teach us that we cannot know God. The problem is not that God is unknowable. The problem is that men do not know and are not listening to the Son (whom God told us to listen to). Because Christ has said that if we know Him, then we know His Father also.



Christ is the Truth, the Image, and the Word of God.




His ways are not are ways

But we can know and follow His ways... by listening TO and following His WAY: His Son, Christ Jaheshua - who is Himself "the Way" (John 14:6).



"I have not spoken on My own, but the Father who sent Me has commanded Me what to say and how to say it." John 14:29

"My teaching is not my own. It comes from the One who sent me." John 7:16

As a believer how do you approach these concepts and what if any effects does it have on your understanding of the bible.

I simply listen to my Lord Jaheshua, and hold all things up against the Light (Christ). If one knows Him, then one does know the Father. He said this so this is true. We can also know what God wants of us, again by listening to the Son and Teacher that God sent TO us (the Son who has the words of eternal life... John 6:68), the One to whom God told us to listen:


"This is my Son, whom I love. Listen to Him."




May anyone who wishes them be granted ears to hear as the Spirit and the Bride say to you, "Come!" May all who wish and all who thirst, "Come! Take the FREE gift of the water of Life."




May you have peace, as my dear Lord gives peace,
your servant and a slave of Christ,
tammy

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Post #4

Post by brianbbs67 »

I would say God reveals Himself to those seeking Him. Draw nigh unto me and I will draw nigh unto you. Seek and find.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?s ... ersion=KJV

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Re: I know you don't know

Post #5

Post by JehovahsWitness »

[Replying to post 1 by kcplusdc@yahoo.com]

God isn't "unknowable", we can not only come to know God but have an intimate relationship with him if we study the bible and put in practise the truths we learn therein.
JOHN 17:3


This means everlasting life, their coming to know you, the only true God, and the one whom you sent, Jesus Christ
One of the first things we learn when getting to know someone is we learn their name. God's name is Jehovah and any sincere person can have a personal relationship with that one if they are willing to study the bible. Jehovah's Witnesses are on a mission to find all such people and give them the help they need.

JW


RELATED POSTS

Is it really possible to understand the bible?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 714#940714


Go to other posts related to JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES , THE TRUE GOD and ...HERMENEUTICS*
* Interpreting the bible


NOTE All posts I write represent my personal faith based beliefs as one of Jehovah's Witnesses
INDEX: More bible based ANSWERS
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 81#p826681


"For if we live, we live to Jehovah, and if we die, we die to Jehovah. So both if we live and if we die, we belong to Jehovah" -
Romans 14:8

kcplusdc@yahoo.com
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For me....

Post #6

Post by kcplusdc@yahoo.com »

For me Gods beauty and power is only increased by his unfathomable complexity.
This understanding helps in disconnecting my ego and self will when it comes to God. For example, I don't have to be right or dogmatic about my thoughts relating to Him. It allows for a more mystical experience of his truths.
Additionally this frees me up from needing people to see it my way. It allows me to respect people's right to independently explore truth on their own.
Who am I to say that God doesnt allow for many paths that all end up going to the same place? Perhaps the basic reoccurring spiritual themes in the world's major spiritual traditions speak to this idea.
I focus on the fruits of ideas than the ideas themselves.

Appreciate the replies and thoughts

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Re: I know you don't know

Post #7

Post by William »

[Replying to post 5 by JehovahsWitness]
God isn't "unknowable", we can not only come to know God but have an intimate relationship with him if we study the bible and put in practise the truths we learn therein.
You are conflating 'GOD' with 'The Bible' and this is why you have come to the conclusion you have.

You 'know' GOD in the relationship of the medium rather than in the relationship of GOD without the medium. Essentially the medium is the GOD you know.

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Re: I know you don't know

Post #8

Post by PinSeeker »

kcplusdc@yahoo.com wrote: A simple bible search will pull up a number of verses, in both the new and old testament that basically state God is unknowable.
No, but only that we are limited in our ability to fully comprehend God's thoughts and ways. This has nothing to do with whether He is knowable or not.

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Re: I know you don't know

Post #9

Post by De Maria »

kcplusdc@yahoo.com wrote: A simple bible search will pull up a number of verses, in both the new and old testament that basically state God is unknowable.
His ways are not are ways, and the ussual parade of verses confirm the idea of God being outside our ability to quantify.
God didn't reveal this in order to discourage us from knowing Him. He revealed this
in order for us to know that in order to know Him, we must change the way
we do things. Change the way we think.

Matthew 16:23 Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.�
In fact it may be impossible to know any creature completely.
For example I can study ants my whole life yet still will never know them fully.
Further more it is important to point out that ants and man live on a level playing field, both exist and are subject to the rules of this universe.
God does not play by these rules.
Therefore it can logically be assumed that knowability would be even harder to achieve with God as he is not subject to the laws of universe and exists outside of time.
Personally, I'm not concerned with that sort of knowledge about God. The Church has revealed that God loves us. That God is, in fact, love itself. And that God wills that we love Him in return.

Not only that, but that we love Him by taking care of our neighbor.
Having established the above idea how does one view the bible? Can it be viewed as a typical book? How do you take directions from someone who says you won't be able to understand them? How do you know that you are understanding Gods word correctly or missing the mark?
I know if I understand the Bible correctly because we have 2000 years of interpretive Tradition that I can research to see what people that have come before me have understood from certain passages. They are called commentaries and they come from many sources, but I restrict myself to the one's provided by the Catholic Church. I believe she has been given the charism of infallibility by Jesus Christ.
Surely one can not start a conversation with the idea that God is unknowable and then continue with this is what he wants from you?
Of course not. God wants us to know Him. But He cautions that in order to know Him, we must seek righteousness and holiness, without which, we will not be able to see Him.

Hebrews 12:14 Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord.
As a believer how do you approach these concepts and what if any effects does it have on your understanding of the bible.
Jesus Christ established the Church and commanded her to Teach us all that He wanted us to do. The Church wrote the New Testament as a tool for us to learn God's will.

I hope that answers your question.

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Re: I know you don't know

Post #10

Post by ttruscott »

kcplusdc@yahoo.com wrote: A simple bible search will pull up a number of verses, in both the new and old testament that basically state God is unknowable.
Unknowable only by sinners.

Once we are brought to holiness so that we can fulfill our purpose to join HIM in the truly loving holy communion of the real marriage, of course we will know HIM then. And the process of knowing HIM starts as our sanctification starts and we go thru the process of Heb 12:5-11.
PCE Theology as I see it...

We had an existence with a free will in Sheol before the creation of the physical universe. Here we chose to be able to become holy or to be eternally evil in YHWH's sight. Then the physical universe was created and all sinners were sent to earth.

This theology debunks the need to base Christianity upon the blasphemy of creating us in Adam's sin.

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