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Luddite
I watch Fox News


Registered: 03/23/06
Posts: 2,946
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Abraham
#5435516 - 03/23/06 06:52 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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After reading a lot about terrorism and religion after 911, I remembered the experience I had when in Sunday school years ago about the story of Abraham thinking God ordered him to kill his son and then provided a sheep in his place to be sacrificed. When I first heard that story, I couldn't believe God would order someone to kill his son. After thinking about it for a while, recently, I thought maybe the original story was changed and that maybe Abraham wanted to kill his son because he was starving, but instead found a sheep which he killed and ate. Abraham probably thought this was God's will. Over time the starving part of the story was lost and the story became one about a blood thirsty God which could order a man to do anything he wanted.
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barfightlard
tales of theinexpressible



Registered: 01/29/03 
Posts: 8,670
Loc: Canoodia
Last seen: 14 years, 1 month
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Re: Abraham [Re: Luddite]
#5435575 - 03/23/06 07:03 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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Maybe? I wouldn't trust anything in the bible as truth, even if I did follow a religion. Too much time and too much translation has gone by. Thats if the whole thing wasn't fabricated in the first place, but thats a different discussion.
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"What business is it of yours what I do, read, buy, see, say, think, who I fuck, what I take into my body - as long as I do not harm another human being on this planet?" - Bill Hicks
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MarkostheGnostic
Elder


Registered: 12/09/99
Posts: 14,279
Loc: South Florida
Last seen: 3 years, 2 days
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Re: Abraham [Re: Luddite]
#5436023 - 03/23/06 09:23 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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The story is a midrashic one which illustrates the degree of faith that is possible - a faith which transcends the desire for a son by a very old man (his wife Sarah was 80). Isaac was born to Abraham and Sarah in their advanced years, and yet Abraham, as well as his wife, encountered God (God, who changed their names from Abram and Sarai to Abraham and Sarah - symbolic, midrashic details). Isaac is supposed to be about 25 years old, and goes willingly to sacrifice at his father's hand. This theme is recapitulated with Jesus and God in the NT. Meanwhile, Abraham could not wait for God's promise, so he impregnates his servant girl Hagar, who gives birth to Ishmael, and then Abraham banishes Hagar and baby Ishmael to the desert (nice guy). Of course Ishmael becomes the seed of the Arabs, and their eventual enmity toward the Jews, evolving Mohammed in due course.
If you can't read this as midrash and mythos - you, like the rest of the Literalist world, are in deep caca. Soren Kierkegaard dealt with Abraham in 'Panegyric on Abraham' in Fear and Trembling: The Sickness Unto Death.
-------------------- γνῶθι σαὐτόν - Gnothi Seauton - Know Thyself
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Booby
Agent Mulder

Registered: 09/14/05
Posts: 3,781
Last seen: 14 years, 1 month
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Re: Abraham [Re: Luddite]
#5437336 - 03/24/06 06:55 AM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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The biography of Ghengis Khan was on tv and I was struck by the similarity to the Cain & Able story in that they each killed a brother.
Genesis 4:3-8 And in process of time it came to pass, that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering unto the Lord. 4 And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof. And the Lord had respect unto Abel and to his offering: 5 But unto Cain and to his offering he had not respect. And Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell.
6 And the Lord said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth? and why is thy countenance fallen? 7 If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.
8 And Cain talked with Abel his brother: and it came to pass, when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Abel his brother, and slew him.
http://www.christnotes.org/bible.php?q=Genesis+4&ver=kjv
"Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering unto the Lord. 4 And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof. And the Lord had respect unto Abel and to his offering: 5 But unto Cain and to his offering he had not respect."
Luddite said: "Over time the starving part of the story was lost and the story became one about a blood thirsty God which could order a man to do anything he wanted."
Presumably, the Lord preferred cuddly lambs.
"brought of the firstlings of his flock"- I wonder if this is in anyway associated with Exodus 12:12 "For I will pass through the land of Egypt this night, and will smite all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods [3] of Egypt I will execute judgment: I am the Lord." Exodus 12:29 "And it came to pass, that at midnight the Lord smote all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh that sat on his throne unto the firstborn of the captive that was in the dungeon; and all the firstborn of cattle."
Edited by Booby (03/24/06 07:50 AM)
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