Hmmm you may be thinking, now he’s become a “Bible thumper.” a “holy roller,” one of them “fundamentalists,” or “evangelicals,” etc. Well, I can assure you I am none of those. Perhaps I should have titled this blog “I love the Bible, BUT….” That would be more accurate, perhaps. So let me explain. I love the Bible, I read and study the Bible a lot. Also, the scriptures from other religions, not just the Hebrew and Christian scriptures. So, maybe, in a sense this blog should be subtitled , “My weirdness, part 2,” in conjunction with my blog regarding my weirdness by being a pilot and obsessed with aviation details ( blog # 28).
A little background may help to explain what I’m talking about regarding my love of the Bible. I was forced to attend church and Sunday school as a child. Then my family ceased attending church. This was when the civil rights movement was going on in the 1960’s in this country. My family did not like churches getting involved in the issue as my family was not in favor of “civil rights.” I didn’t agree with them on this, but I did like the fact that mandatory church attendance was now a thing of the past. Freedom at last from church, I thought.
So, church-free life went on for a few years. My childhood and early teen years were not the greatest for me. I experienced a lot of emotional and psychological turmoil and pain living at home and couldn’t wait to leave home after high school graduation. It was really bad at times and one day I had a “come to Jesus” experience. I needed something to help me survive what I was experiencing and a religious conversion experience helped stabilize me emotionally. It was my salvation, in a sense.
I eventually got involved in a church that my high school friends attended and did a lot of activities with my “church gang.” It was a fun time. I found an escape from my family problems and the depression I had been living with for a long time. After high school I decided to go to a Christian college in Seattle ( there’s a story there for another blog sometime). That decision got me away from home and family and I was looking forward to a college education with a religious perspective. This had to be a good plan, I thought, and as it turns out, it was. I loved my college years. I learned a lot, made some great friends and loved traveling between Los Angeles and Seattle in my VW bug when I came home for summer vacations. It was a fantastic time. And along with this, I got a pretty good religious education, from a Christian perspective, of course, but it was broader than that. My mind was opening up to religion and philosophy and the deep issues of existence.
After college I decided to continue my religious education by going to a theological seminary and working on my Masters of Divinity degree. I did not finish my studies there but really enjoyed the time I spent there studying theology.
So, through it all, I got a good grounding in religious and philosophical studies. I developed a keen interest in what life is all about, about the great mystery of life. After all the study, though, you learn that no matter how much schooling you have or how many degrees you earn, you come to realize, if you are honest with yourself, it’s all a gigantic mystery. Nobody has the answers. Nobody! It’s all speculation!
So, what’s the result of all my studies and life experience? I have developed an intense interest in looking at this mystery called “life'” “existence,” and death. What the hell is all of this? Why are we here? What’s the point? So, I love studying it all and yet at the same time I know there really is no answer to find. We must just live “in the mystery!”
That’s why I love the bible, as well as other religious scriptures and writings. It’s interesting to see how people have handled this great mystery of life through thousands of years. The bible is full of wonderful stories, wonderful teachings, wonderful truths, if you see it that way. Oh, yes, and it is full of some raunchy, awfully violent tales. It also contains some bad advice ( stoning your children, stoning adulterers to death, etc.) It’s human history in the raw and human fantasy and fiction. The biblical scholars are always dissecting the writings and finding new and often fascinating information. In another lifetime I would probably desire to be a biblical scholar, or at least a professor of comparative religions. Ain’t that weird! I guess I just abhor a superficial, shallow, materialistic life.
So, yes, I am a bit obsessed with all of this. I have, at last count, about sixteen or more bibles in different translations. Protestant bibles, a Catholic bible, a Jehovah’s Witness bible, the Koran, the Bhagavad Gita, the lost gospels, the Book of Mormon… well, you get the idea, I’m a nut for the worlds scriptures. I have bible commentaries, handbooks, dictionaries, etc.
So, I love the Bible in a way a scholar would love and study it. It is fascinating. It is inspiring, it can give insight and so much more. My caution to people would be to not take it literally. Those who take it literally have real problems. It’s a collection of writings. See it for what it is. Read up on scholars who devote their lives to this study. It does contain truth. Don’t follow a fundamentalist preacher or televangelist who knocks biblical scholarship and is going to tell you what it all means.
Most people, I would say, do not read the Bible. Some do, but they take it literally and follow what their preacher tells them it says and means. That’s too bad, I say. A lot can be learned from the writings if approached in the right, rational, reasonable way. It’s too bad the secularist, agnostic person can’t often be open minded enough to enjoy it for what it is, for what it gives the serious reader. Much is missed in a lifetime spent avoiding the study of religious scriptures. So much of our culture and society has its roots and formation in religious writings. Even during the years I was a strong atheist I still read the Bible. I just read it with an atheist viewpoint, and I don’t see that as a bad thing. Study truth, I say, whatever that involves. I read recently regarding the bible that even a good book can contain bad things. I would agree. Look at all of it, ponder it, and as I always say, think.
In closing. I would just say that two of my favorite books of the Bible are Ecclesiastes in the Hebrew scriptures (Old Testament) and James (New Testament). You know Ecclesiastes, “all is vanity; eat drink and be merry for tomorrow we die: to everything there is a season (“Turn, turn, turn,” the song by the Byrds, 1965). I love that book. And the book of James, “Faith without works is dead!” The book Martin Luther hated, did not want it in the Bible and tore it out of bibles because he hated it so much.
So there you have it, my weird love of the Bible as a theology student and a person of faith, but not fundamentalist, evangelical faith. A long twisted life path of “born again,” “atheist,” then a spiritual person of faith again.
Wally