Date: Wed, 15 Oct 1997 22:55:16 0500
To: Rob Weinberg
From: Frank Grose
Subject: Acquaintance
Rob,
I have learned a lot from you regarding the history of the Jews. I can understand why you must be vigilant in watching for hostilities. While such treatment in the past is inexcusable, I just hope that the climate, in this country at least, is not hostile. As a gentile Christian, I don't see anti-Semitism as a problem for American Jews (except for the KKK, Skinheads, etc.), but they are kooks.
Our lack of being able to find a common foundation on which to evaluate beliefs is rather frustrating. Let's make it our goal to find some basis of agreement. What are your views on Creation as found in Genesis? I know we may not share the exact same understanding of who our respective "God" is, but do you believe in a Creator? Also, do you accept the Torah as God's (Jehovah) word?
Regards,
Frank
Date: Thu Oct 16 09:59:11 1997
To: Frank Grose
From: Rob Weinberg
Subject: Re: Acquaintance
At 10:55 PM 10/15/97 0500, you wrote:
I have learned a lot from you regarding the history of the Jews. I can understand why you must be vigilant in watching for hostilities. While such treatment in the past is inexcusable, I just hope that the climate, in this country at least, is not hostile. As a gentile Christian, I don't see anti-Semitism as a problem for American Jews (except for the KKK, Skinheads, etc.), but they are kooks.
Overt anti-Semitism may not be as prevalent as it used to be except as you've noted. But for me, there's not much of a fine distinction between the kind of intolerance and disregard for the beliefs of others you saw in those Pike County Schools articles and overt anti-Semitism. History and experience shows it just doesn't take much to go from one to the other. That's why I, like Deputy Barney Fife, say you got to "nip it, nip it in the bud!"
Our lack of being able to find a common foundation on which to evaluate beliefs is rather frustrating.
Well, I've been thinking about it a lot these days too, but don't be frustrated. That you recognize the inherent difficulties is the first major hurdle to overcome. That you want to get past it is what truly sets you apart and what makes me believe our dialog is worthwhile and potentially very productive not just for its own sake, but for future lessons we can apply.
Let's make it our goal to find some basis of agreement.
Agreed! Now, what we have to do is define our "mission statements." Think in terms of "let's put a man on the moon within this decade." (Oh, that's been done.) You get the idea. To get us started:
Do you think the idea of a world of people getting along who have many different beliefs in God is a worthwhile pursuit? I'm not being facetious. People who react negatively to the "Christian right," as I am prone to, do not believe that generally speaking the "right" shares that goal. If you believe that ought to be a goal the "right" should share, then we're halfway there.
It's easy to say "yes" to that proposed mission statement, but you have to seriously and honestly ask yourself whether that's an objective you can reconcile with your belief that there is only "One Way." Give it some serious thought, and if you have doubts, that's OK, maybe we can explore them.
What are your views on Creation as found in Genesis? I know we may not share the exact same understanding of who our respective "God" is, but do you believe in a Creator? Also, do you accept the Torah as God's (Jehovah) word?
Well, we know that I don't believe in the inerrant word of the Bible, whoever's version we're looking at, including the Torah. Even accepting the premise for the sake of argument that in its original (Greek? Hebrew? Aramaic?) it was divinely written, there are too many translation and compilation issues for me it accept it at face value. There are too many internal inconsistencies for it to be self-proving. So I doubt how fruitful our discussions can be on that topic. We can't have much meaningful debate on what the Bible *really* means or how to interpret it when your approach is that it's divinely written and it says what it says and I'm looking at it as fourteen levels of hearsay.
The Talmud is centuries of debate about what the lessons from the Bible really mean. It is that search for meaning that is intrinsic to Jewish scholarship (if I may generalize). Paul wrote 60 years after the death of Jesus as if he were there. Why are there multiple "the gospel according to..." in the N.T.? Shouldn't there be just one "the gospel"? I have a problem with things like that. I don't think science and evolutionary theory have to be incompatible with the genesis story, but believe (accepting for the sake of argument that God created the world) that it was written in the common metaphor of the day according to man's then-understanding of nature and the nature of things. And so, on a number of different fundamental levels, although I hate to have to say "never," I don't think I'd ever accept the premise that the Bible is the inerrant word.
We might have a shot if we began with the mutual premise that the Bible is subject to mis-interpretation because it was "recorded" by man, recognizing the limitations of its authors, the idea that they were expressing themselves in the language of the day, using concepts that were limited by their comparative lack of scientific understanding, that ours by the same token is also limited, recognizing the probabilities mis translations contribute to misinterpretation.
Look at the debate about what our founding fathers meant only a short 200 years ago, the "original intent" question. We don't have translation problems, but already we have frame of reference questions that may never be answered. The writings of Jefferson were written in the language of the day, so there *would* be references to the divine hand of God, even though Franklin, Madison, Jefferson, Washington and many others didn't believe he played a hand in current events. Concepts of "ordered liberty" were influenced if not derived from the radical (for the time) philosophical writings of men like Locke, Hobbes, Rousseau. Their "natural law" theories are not expressed in the Bible and yet Jefferson and the framers write in terms that employ the idea of intervention by God. So the language of the day, even though in English, had variations of meaning that we don't employ as readily today.
Madison himself was a central figure in the debates, yet he does not publish his extensive "Notes" until after his death, expressly because he did not want people arguing and publishing among themselves about original intent. There's a lot we'll never know about what really went on, the backroom compromises, the nighttime meetings among members with agendas, probably where the real work was done. Was Hamilton really absent as he appears, or was he working behind the scenes, and if so, to what degree?
And that's only 200 years ago. Multiply that by 10 and we have ten times the number of problems going back just to the origin of the new testament, let alone the issues of different versions, mis-translations and publication by men like King James who likely had their own agendas. Multiply those problems by 30 (6000 yrs/200 yrs. = 30) and you've got 30 times the potential problems with the meaning of the old testament.
Anyway. Didn't mean to turn that into the definitive argument about why the Bible isn't THE WORD, just to provide my frame of reference, and thoughts about the difficulty in discussing various part of it without a common or mutual approach to the topic.
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