so which bits of the bible do you take seriously ?
some of it, all of it, the bits you like or none of it ?
I take it all seriously and none of it as serious as most. I simply do not take it to be literal and absolute truth. I view God to be all that is (life) and we are all inspired by God. Life inspires us to search for truth and understanding, but we are fallible, just as the writers of the bible were fallible. Truth can be an elusive thing, but life is what inspires us to search for it and often times we are also inspired to teach others and write down what our inspiration has led us to believe. Take the many holy texts available to us, for example. What is seemingly true for one religious sect is often times considered to be a fallacy by another. God is more than a concept or a mental construct. God is more than what our minds imagine him to be.
What I'm suggesting is that our thoughts, beliefs, and all we think we understand derives from life. This doesn't make our views accurate, but rather inspired by our life experiences. We are very creative and imaginative creatures, so we invent concepts in order to help us understand what is. We have a plethora of different concepts of God, but as I suggested, God is more than a mental construct. To me, God is all things! To me, God is life in its entirety, knowable, searchable, and infinite.
With being said, our thoughts originate from external and internal variables, subjective experience, objective reality, as well as from faulty processed information. We in effect, create an image of what we think to be true when these images aren't necessarily accurate. We are fallible, creative, imaginative, and we often conclude prematurely. We often think we know a thing, call that thing truth, and then idle. We should never stop attempting to understand God. I think when we do this (conclude and idle) we in effect prevent ourselves from gaining further understanding.
Logic would dictate that the bible is somewhat a history book describing mankind's journey in life, and how they imagined God to be this and that, and how God desired this and that from man, etc. It' a great book, no doubt. Literary genius if you ask me. It has everything a person could want in a book. I mean it has war, violence, blood, rape, incest, but also hope, love, redemption, and goodness. It's about the worst humanity has to offer, yet also about the best we can hope for as a people.
Perhaps you view the bible is the only means to know God. I might suggest that we can know God through life and love. Many place the book above creation in all its wonder, while I recognize God in all things (even in scripture) but I also realize that the scriptures are not infallible. Most of the writ was penned by men after countless years of oral tradition, and thus are subject to human error, just as we are.
"In light of how I view God, I think scientists may have a better understanding of God than many who are religious. Scientist base their views on the objective universe instead of on ancient and supernatural systems of belief. Religion certainly serves its purpose and continues to fill the needs of its adherents, but science could very well be the best system when it comes to understanding God's reality.
I think most scientists would probably scoff at this idea, that there's a God at all, but what if? What if God IS life/existence/reality? Wouldn't science then be the best system to utilize in an attempt to better understand our point of origin? What if atheists and scientists actually posses a better understanding of God than do most theists? Wouldn't that be something? Of course, few in the secular community would consider the possibility, nor would the religious community consider such a notion. Even so, It could be possible that religion has perverted the truth of God, while science has been faithful all along."
