The Bible is a Good Book, But God Didn't Write It

[rug]

Bishop John Shelby Spong talks with RD about GOP politics, embracing insecurity, and the fate of Christianity.

Reclaiming the Bible for a Non-Religious World
by John Shelby Spong
HarperOne, 2011

January 8, 2012
Interview by Candace Chellew-Hodge

Retired Episcopal Bishop John Shelby Spong is used to being a lightning rod for religious debate. Known affectionately as “Jack” to his friends, Spong has been taking religious literalists to task for over 40 years.

The bishop made a big splash a couple of years ago when he issued a “Manifesto” in which he declared: “I will no longer debate the issue of homosexuality in the church with anyone.” Southern Baptist Theological Seminary president Albert Mohler responded that this was fine with him as “Bishop Spong rejects any claim that the Bible is the Word of God.”

Mohler will find verification of his view in Spong’s new book Reclaiming the Bible for a Non-Religious World. Right there, on page 15, Spong writes: “I do not think for one moment that Bible is any literal sense the ‘Word of God.’” This book is Spong’s way of putting the Bible back in its right perspective — as a collection of “tribal” stories that sprang from “the experience of human beings seeking to make sense out of the life they are living and the things they are experiencing.”

Spong invites readers to consider the Bible more deeply. His approach opens up the Bible in a new way and invites us all to engage the texts, argue with them, and use it make new meaning for our own experiences and lives. This, Spong argues, makes the Bible more than a manual for morality, but a living document.

http://www.religiondispatches.org/books/atheologies/5527/the_bible_is_a_good_book,_but_god_didn%27t_write_it/

This is more subtle than the headline.

[lazarus]

1. a question

if the Bible isn't written by god, what makes it stand out as "more than a manual for morality, but a living document" more than other mythologies?

[rug]

2. You missed this.

“I do not think for one moment that Bible is any literal sense the ‘Word of God.”

It is widely considered by believers to be divinely inspired, not divinely written.

[lazarus]

3. I had missed that, thanks

I know in the religion of my youth, and still to this day in some denominations, it is, indeed, considered to literally be the Word of God. So, I would change your statement to be "some believers".

[MarkCharles]

4. So books written in response to other gods are NOT "divinely inspired"?

They are just books? Who determines that? Determines with what standards?

[rug]

5. Each group determines its own beliefs. Believe it or not.

There's no board of underwriters applying industry standards.

[Rowdyboy]

6. Bishop Spong makes me extremely proud to be an Episcopalian....he's been a hero of mine

for many years.

The Bible was compiled by men under pressure who were guided by politicians, theocrats and an emperor. They deliberately diminished the role of women, omitted gospels and teaching by Christians deemed "unacceptable" and produced a book that only a committee could love.

It is a book of great spiritual significance, full of wisdom and poetry but also full of myth and bigotry. Consider it in the general outlines of the Roman Empire circa 350 AD and take it for what its worth.

[deacon_sephiroth]

7. no it's not, and obviously n/t

[rug]

8. Let me ponder the depth of your answer.