Is the Bible a supernatural book?

Thinking required said:
I did a little research, not in-depth. I don't think they would compare, Hindu's worship many different gods.
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Sometimes Hinduism is referred to by Westerners as "polynomial monotheism" although that's not quite right. There is a belief in an ultimate god, Brahman, though they look at God somewhat differently than Westerners do. https://slife.org/hindu-views-on-monotheism/
They do understand the Vedas to be of supernatural origin. Their culture, theology, and understanding of things is quite different from the Jewish texts History of Vedas: https://www.worldhistory.org/The_Vedas/
 
There is a view that the Good never repeats itself – being All-Possibility – it's a bit of a discussion.

My point would be that because someone's sacra doctrina reads like this, it's a benchmark and measure for everybody else's sacra doctrina.I think that's a flaws assumption.

There is a speculative Jewish teaching that the entirety of the Bible in in the first letter ... then in the first word ...

And the Traditional Christian teaching that the Bible is a Body of Christ – read the Bible, meet Our Lord.

Hence the tradition of showing reverences towards sacred books – they are, after all, just books, but they are something more – Islam reverences the Quran, and explains that such reverence is not idolatry of a book.

And there is Om/Aum.

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Much the same way as the whole of Christianity is summed up in the Cross.

The Jesus Prayer:
"Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner" sums up the whole of one's faith. And it can be shortened, In the end, one sylable will say the same, if the soul is in the right place. "Lord."

There is an amusing story that St Thomas Aquinas argued that when the stonemason drops his club-hammer on his foot, or the carpenter hammers his thumb, the ejaculatory "Je-sus Christ!" is not 'taking the Lord's Name in vain, but is in fact a prayer for assistance.
 
Thinking required said:
I did a little research, not in-depth. I don't think they would compare, Hindu's worship many different gods.
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Or none at all. ;)

The amount of gods Hindus worship has little to nothing to do with how the Vedas flow. There are roughly 30 Vedic gods, and they all serve different purposes. They interact with one another in the Vedas rather than this Hindu author recognizing this god and that Hindu author recognizing that god.

The four Vedas are a collection rituals, ceremonies, meditations, philosophies, sacrifices, and spiritual knowledge. While I personally haven't read them each cover to cover, I've read about them, and I've read and am studying the Upanishads, which are writings taken directly from the Vedas.

As to whether or not the Vedas compare to the Bible, I'm not interested in such a comparison. The two come from two entirely different paradigms, and I never considered holy books to be a contest of which one is better.
 
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Cino said:
Not always for the better. It can go either way.
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You are inserting your opinions here. Did the Bible create bad people? I would say not, they were bad people who were not changed by the book that they claim to be part of. Are all Muslims good people, or are some acting evil, like when they shout, "d3ath to Israel" Are they following the guidance of the Quran. Be careful about throwing stones.
 
Thinking required said:
You are inserting your opinions here. Did the Bible create bad people? I would say not, they were bad people who were not changed by the book that they claim to be part of.
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When you ask for people's opinions, you should be prepared to take them in.

I've seen some people's lives take a turn for the better, influenced by reading the Bible. To them, it was a source of inspiration, and it gave hope and direction to them.

I've seen other people suffer truly hellish torments, and spiral into a pit of despair they never recovered from, due to things they read in the Bible.

That is what I have seen. I am not judging the people I've described, or the Bible. Just reporting what happened.
 
I have found that reverently held Zoroastrian writings are interesting, probably no more self contradictory than the Bible, and in my opinion fairly consistent. Hymns, laws, letters, prophecies, cosmology, creation, future salvation are areas addressed by these writings. I don't know how many languages these are written in, but at least Avestan and some Persian and Indian dialect. Avesta dot org has many Zoroastrian documents. Many were written more than 2000 years ago.

Manichaeans have a large number of writings by multiple authors, in multiple languages - Sogdian, Chinese, Latin, others. The writings are no more incredible than Genesis, no more esoteric than the Book of Revelations, no less plagiarized than Psalms. If Christian history had followed Mani rather than Paul, I don't think the world would be very different other than there would be a lot more vegetarians.
 
I have also heard testimonies of several people who said their lives were completely changed for the better by accepting the Quran. Of course Islam, like Christianity, has an incredible diversity of sects. Not just ones like the Ismaili, but numerous Sufi groups that show little similarity to the most familiar forms of Islam. So some of these lives may have been changed by forms of Islam that are pluralistic, pacific, flexible.
 
I have to believe the Adi Granth also radically changed lives, uniting some who were formally Muslims and some who were formally Hindus. It, too, and the deuterocanonical Dadam Granth, were written in multiple languages by multiple composers and compilers.

This and Zorastrianism and Manichaeism are all interesting from the perspective of comparative religion. Their shared characteristics might be factors that make for a more flexible religious world view, and thus a more pragmatic and appealing one.
 
Cino said:
When you ask for people's opinions, you should be prepared to take them in.

I've seen some people's lives take a turn for the better, influenced by reading the Bible. To them, it was a source of inspiration, and it gave hope and direction to them.

I've seen other people suffer truly hellish torments, and spiral into a pit of despair they never recovered from, due to things they read in the Bible.

That is what I have seen. I am not judging the people I've described, or the Bible. Just reporting what happened.
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I do take them in and I do realize that all kinds of people have been affected by the Bible in many different ways. Did the Bible cause the "despair" or did this person already have problems? Was this a perfectly happy and secure person, from what I have learned about people I would have to say no, there is more to this story. The story of the Bible is HOPE. and only "despair" to those who reject Christ.

To place blame is what everyone does, it's human nature. No one wants to be responsible for who they are. Yes, there are many sad cases where children were damaged, and many unrecoverable. It's not that I don't understand, it's that I do understand humanity, not every circumstance, but humans. I don't discredit what you have seen, there is always bias played into every scenario. Bias is built into what we believe.
 
Sky Milinet said:
I have also heard testimonies of several people who said their lives were completely changed for the better by accepting the Quran.
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I think that I have tried to make it clear that "changed lives" is not the same as "transformed lives" two different words with some overlap. A transformed life is going to be a changed life, a changed life is not necessarily going to be a transformed life. I am not disagreeing about the change of a person's life by reading any book. Many books have changed lives. Books by Blaise Pascal have changed by life, but they haven't transformed it.
 
Thinking required said:
I don't discredit what you have seen
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For Cino, I thought that I was not trying to hold you to this blame game. No, the people within the circumstances will try to blame. But just about everyone will at sometime try to blame someone else for their circumstances. I did that for the first 35 years of my life.
 
Thinking required said:
I think that I have tried to make it clear that "changed lives" is not the same as "transformed lives" two different words with some overlap. A transformed life is going to be a changed life, a changed life is not necessarily going to be a transformed life.
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Thanks for clsrifying, Thinking Required. My apologies. I wasn't aware you were asking for something other than '[radically] changed', nor of the difference between 'changed' and 'transformed'. I have seen people (atheist, apathetic, cultural Christian, Muslim in name only, Mormon) undergo very radical changes in worldview, moral behavior, social conduct, outlook (hope, expectations, confidence, etc.). Too many in the opposite direction, into atheism, hatred, depravity. I would have considered some of them to have experienced transformative changes. What is the definition of 'transformed' in the context of your questions?
 
Sky Milinet said:
What is the definition of 'transformed' in the context of your questions?
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Here is what one resource says about the Greek word.

The word is metamorphoomai (μεταμορφοομαι), which speaks of the act of a person changing his outward expression from that which he has to a different one, an expression which comes from and is representative of his inner being. The word is used in Matthew 17:2 where it is translated “transfigured.” The translation could read, “The manner of His outward expression was changed before them, and His face shone as the sun, and His clothing was white as the light.”

Kenneth S. Wuest, Wuest’s Word Studies from the Greek New Testament: For the English Reader, vol. 2 (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997), 207.

I look at transformation as something that I did not do, unlike change. They can look very similar. There is a reason why the Greek did not use the word for "change". It's what God does and not what we do.
 
Thinking required said:
Here is what one resource says about the Greek word.

The word is metamorphoomai (μεταμορφοομαι), which speaks of the act of a person changing his outward expression from that which he has to a different one, an expression which comes from and is representative of his inner being. The word is used in Matthew 17:2 where it is translated “transfigured.” The translation could read, “The manner of His outward expression was changed before them, and His face shone as the sun, and His clothing was white as the light.”

Kenneth S. Wuest, Wuest’s Word Studies from the Greek New Testament: For the English Reader, vol. 2 (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997), 207.

I look at transformation as something that I did not do, unlike change. They can look very similar. There is a reason why the Greek did not use the word for "change". It's what God does and not what we do.
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So transliteration not translation?
trans·fig·ure
/ˌtran(t)sˈfiɡ(y)ər/
verb
past tense: transfigured; past participle: transfigured
transform into something more beautiful or elevated.

Are you saying God doesn't want us to change...but to metamorphoomai (μεταμορφοομαι), which speaks of the act of a person changing his outward expression from that which he has to a different one, an expression which comes from and is representative of his inner being...

Then why did they use transfiguration?
 
wil said:
This is an awesome start to any interfaith discussion imo
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To me it shows the self imposed limits we place on interfaith dialogue. There is already a self imposed separation. It is not about which is a better book, it is about what the books offer in making us better people, enabling us to work together for the good of all.

The contents of the books can be viewed in the light that they emanate from the same source. When this is done, it can be seen that they do not reflect entirely different paradigms. There are many complimentary aspects, which are the light that guide us all and aspects that are suited to the age they are given.

Regards Tony
 
Tony Bristow-Stagg said:
To me it shows the self imposed limits we place on interfaith dialogue. There is already a self imposed separation. It is not about which is a better book, it is about what the books offer in making us better people, enabling us to work together for the good of all.
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Then you haven't been following the thread. The OP is asking if there are any books that compare to the flow and how the books compliment one another. The value of scripture is what it teaches, not how well it flows and compliments itself.

Tony Bristow-Stagg said:
The contents of the books can be viewed in the light that they emanate from the same source.
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Parchment?
 
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