How am I supposed to take The Bible seriously...

what was this poison that was put in the waters? it was dust. dust from the temple floor.
the bitter water starts off as holy water in an earthen vessel. it becomes bitter when the dust, and preists hand are dipped in it.

so unless dust from the temple floor was poisonous...

I love when someone who does not believe or adhere to the Christian faith tells me to 'judge not, lest ye be judged'. Know why? A couple of things:

Just quoting it means they automatically take Matther Chapter 7 as an authoritative declaration. This in turn means they admit the authority of Scripture. The next thing is that in admitting the authority of Matthew 7 they also must realize that in the chapter, it says, in a more modern linguistic translation, 'If you jusge, then you too, will be judged' meaning, in modern interpretation, that judging is not necessarily forbiddden, it is just warned to the reader that they will be held to the same standard as those they judge with (see the rest of the chapter). In addition, the chapter, which the person has already confessed as true by quoting it, says 'how can you say to your brother there is a speck in your eye when you have a plank in your own? Go first and remove the plank in your eye then you will see clearly to remove the speck in your brother's eye'

Tell me where it says I cannot point out a sinful deed or thought, action, etc? It doesn't! It simply warns to be sure my life is acceptable to God before I admonish or point out anyone else's flaws.

The problem with most Christians is that they don't remove the plank in their own eye before they try to remove a speck in their 'brother's'.

Originally posted by everlastingnoitall
I love when someone who does not believe or adhere to the Christian faith tells me to 'judge not, lest ye be judged'. Know why? A couple of things:

Just quoting it means they automatically take Matther Chapter 7 as an authoritative declaration. This in turn means they admit the authority of Scripture.

Umm... No, thats not what it means at all. They are instead asking you to take the advice you are supposed to believe in. Whether or not you interpret the meaning of the passage differently is of no consequence.

Originally posted by everlastingnoitall
The problem with most Christians is that they don't remove the plank in their own eye before they try to remove a speck in their 'brother's'.

The problem with most (Christians) is that they do not wait to be asked to help remove the speck before they try to remove it.

If one has ever tried to give medicine to a child, one knows how difficult it is to give something that will help to one who does not want it. How much better is it that the child knows first that the medicine will make him better and comes to you and asks for it?

One cannot teach another who is unwilling to learn. But when one lives one's life in God and teaches of God without judging those he teaches, sometimes one teaching or one action performed is understood by one who is not willing to learn. At this time, the one who is unwilling to learn will seek to understand.

The NIV groups teachings into sections. In the NIV Mat 7:1-6 are in one group. Verse six tells of what happens to riches that are given to those who do not ask.

I do not think it is a coincidence that the very next section in the NIV is Ask, Seek, Knock .

Change starts from within, with the choice to change.

Teacher: A tiger cannot change its spots.
Student: A tiger does not have spots.
Teacher: You can see clearly but seek to change the tiger stripes.
Student: But I do not seek this, I cannot change the tiger's stripes.
Teacher: Because it does not ask.
Student: But the tiger will never ask.
Teacher: But a man will.

.

Wow I never knew that Homosexuality was a Religion?!!!

Maybe this is part of the problem! Lets stop thinking of everything in terms of "Religion" & "Black" & "White"! Humans have the capability to Learn & Grow - who are we to say that the "Infinite Universe" or "God's Plan" is this or that - definitly for sure! Do you have Proof? How about giving people the option to choose what they want to Study, Practice & Believe - as long as they are not harming others, it is their Right!!!

i totally agree seraphrim. and because the bible is a religion and many peoples belief, it should be taken seriously... which is why i tried to answer the question above.

Here is another little bit:

Prepare yourself for the most shocking revelation of your life. Does it come as an astonishing shock to learn that the most important dimension in all knowledge was sent by God to this earth by Jesus Christ - but that message was suppressed in the very first century? That Jesus Himself was put to death for revealing it? That His apostles, with one possible exception, were also matyred for proclaiming it?

Yet this message from the living God, if humanity had received and heeded it, would have saved this world from nearly all of its troubles, sufferings and evils.The very word "gospel" means "good news." That message, when fully understood, reveals a human potential so stupendous - so awesome - it appears at first to be totally beyond belief, yet it has been suppressed from the world until now.

Notice why and how the rejection of Christ's gospel happened. In the eighth chapter of John, verses 30 through 46, you will read:

As he spake these words, many believed on him. Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, If ye continue in my word, [His message] then are ye my disciples indeed; ... but ye seek to kill me, because my word [His gospel message] hath no place in you.... But now ye seek to kill me, a man that hath told you the truth, which I have heard of God ... for I proceeded forth and came from God, neither came I of myself, but he sent me.... And because I tell you the truth, ye believe me not.... And if I say the truth, why do ye not believe me?

In due time, the Romans crucified Jesus. But He rose from the dead and ascended into heaven. From there, He sent God's Holy Spirit for His disciples. Christ's apostles went out, as He commissioned them, to proclaim His message to the world. God's Church was raised up (A.D. 31) to back the proclaiming of the message. The Church began to grow, then "caught fire," and multiplied.

But Satan connived to set up a powerful Gentile religious leader with a counterfeit religion - the ancient Babylonian mystery religion. He hatched a counterfeit "gospel." He even appropriated the name of Christ, calling that religion "Christianity." That, I know, is a breathtaking revelation, difficult today, 1900 years later, to believe. But nonetheless, it is true!

The Counterfeit "Gospel" Is Set Up...

There is a lot of good information in this article, I'd recommend reading it.

reluctant-messenger.com...

Herbert W. Armstrong has a long history of spinning some pretty fantastic yarns and supporting them with a few judiciously spinkled scriptures. I do not find this story very compelling in so far as he doesn't provide anything substantive to support his argument, at least in the first chapter.

For example:

In Samaria, north of Jerusalem, lived a Gentile people whom the Jews of Christ's day spurned, calling them "dogs." They had been moved there from areas of the Babylonian Empire about 700 B.C. by various kings, including Shalmaneser of Assyria (II Kings 17:18, 21-24, etc.). They had brought with them into the land of Samaria their own Babylonian mystery religion. In the eighth chapter of Acts you'll read of their religious leader in the time of Christ, Simon Magus the Sorcerer.

[...]

By about A.D. 58, when the apostle Paul wrote his letter to the Galatians, many already were turning to this now new counterfeit "gospel." Paul wrote: "I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel: which is not another [it was not good news]; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ" (Gal. 1:6-7).

Is there any other scripture or other evidence to support that this other gospel was the work of Simon Magus? Is Armstrong the only individual in possession of this knowledge?

A lot of people realize that the message of Chirst was hijacked and intertwined with any number of other theologies to lure others into the control of the Church. In many ways, Roman Catholicism resembles the secular empire of Rome. Rome was glad for its conquered lands to believe as they desired as long as they were peaceful and paid their taxes.

Many have placed the blame at the feet of Paul, whose writings form the basis of the religion about Jesus. Armstrong alludes to this, but I think he errs when he speaks of an earthly kingdom.

Perhaps you could address some of these issues, if you are familiar with the text.

[edit on 04/9/25 by GradyPhilpott]

Originally posted by NuTroll
i totally agree seraphrim. and because the bible is a religion and many peoples belief, it should be taken seriously... which is why i tried to answer the question above.

I agree that because millions of people take the book seriously, we should take it seriously in the sense of it being an important historical/theological document. But just because millions of people believe it literally doesn't mean it is true or that I should believe it. Millions of people thought the Earth was flat at one time, didn't make the Earth really flat, no matter how many people said, "you blasphemous idiot, don't you know the Earth is flat, everybody knows that."

I just wonder what is the crucial difference that separates the believer & the non-believer. I suppose a Christian would say it is faith or Holy Grace or something. In my case, it was actually doing research into the history of the Bible, the Catholic church, Christians, Gnostics, etc. -- as well as comparative mythology. It was like once I did the research, I couldn't go back to believing that the Bible was literal. I almost regretted doing the research because it took that innocence away that made those stories of of the Bible seem real. It was like being told that Santa didn't exist, but on a much bigger & profound scale. A couple of Christian friends told me that the key is to believe in the Bible as the literal word of God anyway--that reading that other stuff was just a test of my faith.

Originally posted by Cassie Clay
I almost regretted doing the research because it took that innocence away that made those stories of of the Bible seem real.

Just because a text is not to be taken literally, does not mean that it is not real or meaningful or valuable. The value of the ancient texts is not so much in the facts, but in the truth. I don't argue with literalists. You can't ask persons to think beyond their innate capacities.

The best response you can give to a literalist is, "That's interesting. Tell me more," or, "That's interesting, you'll have to tell me about it sometime."

People are really invested in their beliefs and their identities are largely composed of those strongly held beliefs. Make their day. Listen and politely, beg your leave.


[edit on 04/9/25 by GradyPhilpott]

Quote: "and because the bible is a religion and many peoples belief, it should be taken seriously..."

Yes, NuTroll - but what I was trying to get at is that it is a Dual Edged Sword. They have their Book & other people have their Books. Everyone gets to pick their own Book or Books!!!

Fundamentalists have a right to be Conservative/Orthodox &
so-called "Pagan Witches" have a right to Believe & Practice what they choose -> Even if it is just
"Sex, Drugs & Rock n' Roll" or "Naturalistic Rituals"!

This is not what I have been seeing & experiencing however - everywhere I look I see "Theological/Ideological War" or "Culture War"!!!

You see it in Real Life - you see it in the Media - You see it on the Net - you see it EVERYWERE!!! It gets real NASTY & Personal & even Violent!!!


[edit on 25-9-2004 by Seraphim_Serpente]

[edit on 25-9-2004 by Seraphim_Serpente]

Originally posted by Seraphim_Serpente
This is not what I have been seeing & experiencing however - everywhere I look I see "Theological/Ideological War" or "Culture War"!!!

You see it in Real Life - you see it in the Media - You see it on the Net - you see it EVERYWERE!!! It gets real NASTY & Personal & even Violent!!!

Get used to it, Seraphim. It has never been any different and it will be this way on the day you die. The human race will have to evolve considerably before things get any better. The struggle for you is to find your place in the chaos.

I think that really is the main point. Finding your own way through the chaos. It really comes down to the old struggle between good and evil, and that everything is not quite how it seems on the surface.

Faith in God is a wonderful thing, and it is there for anyone that just reaches out. It is really that simple.

I posted this elsewhere, but I think it applies equally well to this discussion:

Jesus offered no rules for social advancement; his was a religious mission, and religion is an exclusively individual experience. The ultimate goal of society's most advanced achievement can never hope to transcend Jesus' brotherhood of men based on the recognition of the fatherhood of God. The ideal of all social attainment can be realized only in the coming of this divine kingdom.
www.urantia.org...

I certainly can't explain this to everyone's satisfaction. Partly because I don't know it all. Some of the lessons from this are that sin is serious. 1. As fallen humans we cannot understand the total concept of how grievous and hideous sin is to God.
2. Nothing is hidden from the eyes of God. 3.What about the woman who was falsely accused. Lets say because her husband wanted to get rid of her and marry another. This was a way to escape death and clear her name.

I asked a question before but no one actually answered me. It was along these lines.

Love God and stick to his rules.
Love your neighbour as your-self.

If everyone followed these two rules (read the 10 commandments for specifics) would the world be a better place?

If not, then the Bible has no relevancy in our world today, and it should be put in the fiction shelf

If society would be better off, then maybe the Bible is not all fiction and we can take it as a guide to live our lives.

People can argue black and blue around the subject. You believe or you dont. It is as simple as that.

What if the truth was staring you in the face?

Hey FLANGE GASKET (& RoseBefore Time since you seemed to agree with Flange about the alleged sanctity/inviolateness of Hebrew and Christian "Scripture"--which is a gross fallacy believed by the uneducated masses who have never read the texts for themselves very closely):

Both of you seem a little muddled about certain basic facts about the formation of the Old and New Testament canons.

Here are a Couple of Questions for you based on a QUOTE from FLANGE:

�When your talking about the Bible, I assume your talking about the KJV: King James Version, of course this isn't really the original bible, it's a translation from the Hebrew and Greek texts that it was originally written in. It's also important to remember that the New Testament had 33 books till Constantine converted the Romans to Christianity, he got rid of six books and edited the gospels (except John, which is apparently unscathed). The original 33 books are available as a translation called the apocrypha, particularly interesting is the Gospel of Thomas, which states that Jesus didn't die on the cross at all, and that Simon of Cyrene stood in for Simon Zelotes. UNQUOTE

Question #1: The KJV (King James Version) is based on several contradictory OT and NT Western Texts that were available to the translators in 1611.

The very "human" and very "fallible" choices that had to be made between all the variant readings in their limited nuber of rather poor quality MSS was highly arbitrary and unsystematic and led to over 300 mistranslations in the King James Version...(e.g. KJV "Render not that which is holy unto the Dogs, neither cast Thy Pearls before Swine..." should read more accurately : "Toss not your Rings to the Dogs, neither Cast your Pearls Before Swine" where RINGS and PEARLS are in poetic parallel)

or KJV "Remember Thy Creator in the Days of Thy Youth" from the book of Ecclesiastes should have read: REMEMBER THY GRAVE IN THE DAYS OF THY YOUTH" etc.) and these are just the smaller ones !

But even MORE GENERALLY I have some questions for you both:

Are you NOT aware that the OLD TESTAMENT was NOT EVER a LITERARY UNITY (in terms of its complex Manuscript Tradition) but was written in at least TWO LANGUAGES (UNPOINTED PALEO HEBREW and ARAMAIC (parts of Daniel, Ezra and Nehemiah)?

That the CANON OF THE OLD TESTAMENT was not even decided until 60 YEARS AFTER �Iesous� was crucified (in other words, �Iesous� did not have an Old Testament as a single book between two covers, and moreover quoted freely from other books not in the OT (but found among the Dead Sea Scrolls in MSS copies that were contemporary with him) such as the Testament of the 12 Patriarchs, the Book of Jubilees (The Scroll of the Book of the Testament of Moses) the Words of Henoch (I Henoch chapter 1-36, and 72-107), The Wisdom of Ben Sirach (=Ecclesiasticus) , the Wisdom of Solomon etc)?

Are you NOT aware that �Iesous� (R. Yehoshua bar Yosef the Galilean) quotes a DIFFERENT BIBLE (OT) from the 2nd Temple Period than the single version used by Rabinnic Jews today as the �received�text (i.e. the "authorised" Masoretic)?

(e.g. The Blind receive their sight, the Deaf Hear, the Lame walk, the captives are freed, AND THE DEAD ARE RAISED---the last part of this Isaiah verse is found ONLY in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the LXX Hebrew underlay-Vorlage BUT THE WORDS DO NOT OCCUR IN TODAY's COPIES OF THE OLD TESTAMENT/Authorised Jewish Masoretic Text used as the �received� canon of the OT?

Are you NOT aware that the OLD TESTAMENT has at least 4 MAJOR SURVIVING (CONTRADICTORY) HEBREW TEXT MANUSCRIPT FAMILIES, NONE OF WHICH MATCH EACH OTHER by MORE THAN 25%?

e.g. the vast DIFFERNECES between the text of the Samaritan Pentateuch, the Hebrew Vorlage (underlay) to the Greek Septuginta LXX found at Qumran, the Later Masoretic Text of AD 850 from Leningrad and all the various contradictory proto Masoretic Dead Sea Scroll copies (1000 years older than the VERY LATE Hebrew Massoretic �received� text)?

Did you know that the Dead Sea Scrolls preserve a Hebrew copy of Jeremiah which matches the Hebrew Underlay of the Greek LXX Seputaginta---which is THIRTEEN CHAPTERS SHORTER THAN THE LATER MASORETIC TEXT?

So much for the �infallible word of G-d� ! So much for YHWH keeping �his truth� together----the more you study the texts, the more you SEE THE HAND OF MAN AT WORK and NOT THE HAND OF ANY CLAN GOD.

And----you, �ROSE BEFORE TIME� ---you seem to think that the LXX Greek OT was a �word for word� translation of the Masoretic !!

BZZZZ: WRONG !!!

NEWSFLASH : IT IS IN FACT DIFFERENT BY more than 25 % !!

Why do you think the Vatican and the Jewish Community did NOT want the Dead Sea Scrolls published for the masses?

Now you know !!

And what about the Aramaic Targums that Matthew�s gospel seems to be aware of when he quotes the OT citations, or the Proto-Syriac Pe#ta text�these major Hebrew based text families don�t match the Masoretic Text very closerly either !!

Question #2: Are you aware that it was not until the 5th century AD (post 465 AD) that the socalled New Testament �Canon� was accepted by both the eastern and western councils and that they still to this day have a different set of books to call the NT? Or that The Gospel of JOHN was considered �heretical� for the first 200 years of its existence and barely got itself voted in by the Bishops?

Question #3: Speaking of John, what makes you think that JOHN�s GOSPEL escaped the �editorial knife� during its long and protracted transmission process?

Who gave you that mis-information? Have you even compared the different text families of the 4th gospel with each other? (Ephraemi, Alexandrinus, Vaticanus, Sinaiticus, Washingtoniensis-Freer, P220, P66, etc.)

Also, as any modern New Testament text scholar will tell you, there is ANOTHER GOSPEL literally buried inside John;s gospel, which compares the 7 miracles with parallel miracles in the Elisha narratives in II Kings chapter 3 to 11�known as the socalled SIGNS GOSPEL (�this was the first Sign that Iesous performed�.�this was the second Sign that Iesous performed�� but the numbering sort of petered out after a while)

And there are several examples in John�s gospel where the text has CLEARLY been tampered with by scribes in the process of transmission, no less than the other gospels and the book of Revelation (i.e. the socalled �marginalia glosses� that were once scribbled as notes in the margins of a given manuscript were later copied into the text itself by later hands�)

Many of these textual changes/alterations may well have occurred in the ORAL STAGE of the Gospel of John before the Greek Text was more or less set in writing around 125 AD or later when it finally became more or less �set in stone� around AD 200.

Here�s a tiny example of some playing fast and loose with an original oral stream before it was written into a Greek text:

(e.g. �For it is written: The Salvation of Israel shall come from Judaea� which is placed into the mouth of �Iesous� in the Woman at the Well Pericope in John chapter 4---the words are actually a DIRECT quote from the Testament of Naphtali chapter 8 verse 13 found among the Dead Sea Scrolls dated about 160 BC, but in the Greek Gospel of John, the whole verse has been deliberately re-written in most copes of John chapter 4 to read:

�For Salvation is of the Judaeans�

as though all mankind (general salvation of mankind) is meant�..

It sure sounds like a bit of heavy �editorialization� was going on there to make this originally Zionist verse sound �more Universal� and far less Zionist than the quote it was based on---and this universalizing editing process is not unique to John�s gospel but can be found in all 4 canonical works.

Also: Constantine did not �convert the Romans� to Christiainity, he merely (by his Edit of Milan 313 AD) allowed �Roman Christianity� to be one of several acceptable religions of the Empire (which included Mithraism, the main rival to Christianity).

And, by the way, the Gospel of Thomas did not actually DENY the event of the Crucifixion, it merely does not MENTION it as an historical event: after all, it was merely a loose collection of �sayings� (some 114 little groups of sayings actually) �by the Living Iesous� �and not a narrative collection of events like the Canonical Gospels...

These are just some things for you both to think about before you continue to spread ignroant disinformation on threads such as these...and to encourage you to do some deeper research and thinking into these matters....which are not quite so simple as you make them out to be !

Amadeus - what Language is the "Samaritan Pentateuch" written in?

Hi Seraphim Serpente:

The SamPent (Samaritan Pentateuch) is actually written in a late 5th century BC Hebrew dialect, but with their very own Samaritan letters.

The actual language of the Samaritans was a northern Palestinian dialect of Hebrew, later superseded by a kind of Mishnaic Galilean type Aramaic Hebrew very close to the kind of language spoken by "Iesous" and his first disciples--- but the Samaritans never did adapt to the southern new AlephBet of Ezra the Scribe--since they broke away around that time, and started their own cult on Mt Gerazim and developed their own distinct variation "Aleph-beth" (alphabet) which is very different from the more familiar post-Exilic Square Aramaic letters that people today associate with "Hebrew".

The square modern Hebrew Alphabet was in fact introduced into Judaea by the school of Ezra the Scribe from Babylon probably around 430 BC:

Before that time, the Judaeans used their own pointed horned paleo Hebrew Phoenician lettering as the Canaanites did.

After 330 BC (When Alexander the Great annexed Palestine to his ever expanding Empire) the Samaritans came into contact with thousands of Greek "importees" into Samaria and within 50 years, Greek was learned to be spoken just as freely among them as their Mishnaic Aramaic-Hebrew.

The few people who call themselves "Samaritans" today hold on to some of the oldest traditions, but speak modern Arabic, and had to learn their Hebrew Texts by traditional study methods, as a "sacred language" like Latin would be to a modern Catholic Priest--understood only if studied at school.

The Samaritan alphabet, as different as it is from the Aramaic letters of Exra, was adapted (and clearly derived) from the older "horned" Paleo Hebrew Phoenician alphabet, but still, with NO VOWELLS)

Examples of the Samaritan text of the Torah (the only text they considered canonical, i.e. "that which defiled the hands") were found happily copied side by side with various non-Masoretic Paleo Hebrew Versions and the later Aramaic Square Lettering versions of the Torah amongst the Dead Sea Scrolls.

The Samaritan cantillation and the text pronunciation (i.e. the vowells used) differs considerably from that settled by the vowells which were added to the "official" Hebrew Masoretic text.

As the Samaritans use neither vowels nor diacritical signs, the pronunciation has only been preserve by tradition; yet, notwithstanding isolated variations, it seems to have remained, on the whole, very close
to the ancient renditions.

This closeness was noticed and praised by the German scholar H. Petermann in his "Versuch einer hebr�ischen Formenlehre nach der Aussprache der heutigen Samaritaner" [Leipzig, 1868].

What was formerly called the "Samaritan Language" rested almost exclusively upon the polyglot edition of the Samaritan Targum which is a late text and full of gramatical howlers.

Samaritan literature's Crown Jewel is of course their famous Samaritan Pentateuch (Sampent) which is a valuable document shedding important light on an early authentic TORAH of the 5th century BC.

(But the SamPent is NOT to be confused at all with the so-called Samaritan Targum which is a later hotch potch of Aramaic paraphrases.)

Samaritans did not seem to have come into possession of their own version of the Torah/Pentateuch until they were definitely formed into an independent community around 440 BC i.e. around the time of Nehemiah in the PERSIAN Period, when they built their own Temple and priests to YHWH upon Mt Gerazim, and this text they reversed actually predates the LXX Septuaginta by at least 150 critical years--which is why the Sam Pent is so valuable to scholars--and so hated by Rabinnic Jews and Christians:

IT SHOWS A CLEAR DEVELOPMENT OF A HEBREW TEXT OF THE TORAH WHICH ONLY BECAME SET IN STONE WITHOUT CHANGES ("OFFICIAL") NEARLY A THOUASAND YEARS LATER !!

A comparison of the Samaritan Pentateuch with the Masoretic text shows that the former varies from the latter in nearly 24% of the time and, on the other hand, where it differs from the "received" text of the MT, it VERY often agrees word for word with the Hebrew Text which must have underlay the Greek LXX Septuagint, the socalled LXX-Vorlage.

For the variant readings of the Samaritan Pentateuch see Kennicott, loc. cit., and for the most complete list see Petermann, loc. cit., 219-26.

More than half of the variations refer to orthographic and grammatic details which are of no importance for the sense of the text; some errors have crept into all the Hebrew versions and it is clear that many others are plainly deliberate changes, as the removal of anthropomorphisms and expressions which seemed objectionable, the bringing into conformity of parallel passages, insertion of additions, different members in the genealogies, changes in favour of the opinions of the Samaritans, among them, in Deut., xxvii, 4, the substitution of Mt Gerizim for Ebl�, and other DELIBERATE changes.

In comparison with the Masoretic text, the Samaritan Pentateuch shows readings which can be neither oversights nor deliberate changes, and of these a considerable number coincide with the Septuagint (i.e. in opposition to the Masoretic text) and show an Independent Tradition which is in some instances older and more reliable than the MT.

Since the LXX and the SamPent agree so many times AGAINST THE Masoretic Text it must have been the case that a copy of the Samaritan Pentateuch (or a variant MSS branch copy) which had been adapted by the Samaritans later ended up (somehow!) in Egypt by the year 350 BC and served as the source text for the Hebrew texts ("Vorlage") which were used to derive the LXX Greek Septuagint translation.

In other words, the Translators of the Septuagint used a Graco-Samaritan version, and the Septuagint shows traces of having gone back to a form of text common to the Palestinian Jews which varies somewhat from the Masoretic text which was after all "Babylonian" and which was settled later--in AD 90 in fact, when Hillel II came back from Babylon to Javneh/Jamnia to establish (postTemple Destruction "non sacrificial" Rabinnic Judaism and an Old Testament Canon of official Scriptures.

The SamPent and the LXX were thus officially "supressed" by Hillel II and his Babylonian Text Family party. The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls opened up an old can of worms, revealing that there were several competing texts of the OT around before Hillel II supressed them for Judaiesm in AD 90---60 years AFTER the time of "Iesous"...!

The most celebrated of the manuscripts of the Samaritan Pentateuch is that in the synagogue at Nablus.

It is a roll made of the skins of rams, and written, according to the belief of the Samaritans, in the thirteenth year after the conquest of Canaan at the entrance to the Tabernacle on Mount Gerizim by Abisha, a great-grandson of Aaron.

Abisha claims for himself he authorship of the manuscript in a speech in the first person which is inserted between the columns of Deut., v, 6 sqq., in the form of what is called a tarikh--a "Fable" which is not literally true, but helps the believers preserve the text as it stands.

The Samaritan Targum

In addition to the Hebrew Pentateuch, the Samaritans had also a translation of this in the Samaritan-Aramaic idiom, the Samaritan Targum.

According to their own account this was written by Nathanael, a priest, who died B.C. 20 and probably re-written into more modern form around AD 300--but the present text of the targum unfortunately is a mishmash of several hundred garbled corrections---pity ! Some scholars have tried to approximate an original text, but it's uphill work: see the St. Petersburg fragments published by Kohn, Zur Sprache, Literatur und Dogmatik der Samaritaner" [Leipzig, 1876], p. 214.

Apparently there wereat least 4 "original" Targum versions which someone around AD 300 tried ito meld into one, but the result was a garbage heap of grammatical inconsistencies.

Does this help any?

Originally posted by shmick25
I asked a question before but no one actually answered me. It was along these lines.

Love God and stick to his rules.
Love your neighbour as your-self.

If everyone followed these two rules (read the 10 commandments for specifics) would the world be a better place?

If not, then the Bible has no relevancy in our world today, and it should be put in the fiction shelf

If society would be better off, then maybe the Bible is not all fiction and we can take it as a guide to live our lives.

People can argue black and blue around the subject. You believe or you dont. It is as simple as that.

What if the truth was staring you in the face?

Yes, society would be better off. That's what the old testament is about. God gave laws to live by. 100% complete compliance. This is where the problem comes in. We cannot live them without God living in us. God's spirit came upon people in the OT to fulfill a function but left them again. On this side of the cross it's different. Once you accept Jesus as Savior, God's spirit enters you and never leaves again. Can you refuse to listen to Him. Yes, but there are consequences involved, not your salvation but discipline and the product of what a sin brings. But with God in you, a christian has the power to say no to temptation and sin. Also on this side of the cross we have the whole story of salvation, it was clouded for those on the front side of the cross.