CutNAz (imported) wrote: Wed Oct 29, 2008 10:12 pm And just to throw a wrench in the works...most modern religions refer to the King James Bible which was specifically translated to reflect King James values.

"The king gave the translators instructions designed to guarantee that the new version would conform to the ecclesiology and reflect the episcopal structure of the Church of England and its beliefs about an ordained clergy." (Wikipedia)

The oldest known complete Christian Bible (both old and new testaments) is being posted online by the British Museum. There are a few books available now, and all books are planned to be posted before the end of 2009.

I will be quite interesting to see how King James' translation stacks up when we can all form our own opinions from the original.

I know many Christians that simply cannot read, and quote scripture out of context. There are religions that count on this!

Many Christians have a strong faith and the ability to not only read, but enjoy some of the taunting of others, it gives us cause to educate both ourselves and others.

There are three distinct stages in the bible...

Stage 1 -

Was canonized while the Jews were being held by Babylon and they felt in danger of loosing there culture identity. So the jewish officials gathered up all the written variations of stories they could find, and some editor went through and pulled things from one source or another to come up with the first five books of Mosses. Note the books of Mosses were not written by Mosses himself and were not written down for decades after the fact. One Babylonian story that was modified and included was the story of Mosses.

Stage 2 -

The Romans took over Israel and once again the Jews were in danger of loosing there culture, so the officials sat down and worked out what they wanted to preach and say and created a canonized version of the rest of the Old testament.

Stage 3 -

After the whole bit with Jesus the 12 apostles all went there own way and started teaching there own versions of Christs lessons. Eventually the 12 churches became three separate camps. In no certain order...camp one was the gnostics, camp two was the Essene's, camp three the followers of Paul. Paul (who never met Christ face to face) would go to settle in Rome and used his influence to get the other christian church's banned (what a nice guy NOT!) Eventually the Roman Empire splits into two parts and one part fails completely. The side of the Roman Empire grew in strength and eventually Emperor Constantine took the post. Constantine grew tired of having many variations of the same stories being verbally and written and in 325 he called all the religious officials together to work out one version of all the stories (this even is called the Council of Nicea). As a group they decided what would be included and what left out. One example is of a story of Jesus pushing a boy off a roof and the boy died because of it. The local officials came to investigate but Jesus brought the boy back to life to keep from getting in trouble. There is another interesting story of Jesus bringing a dead man back to life, and the got up covered only in funeral stuff (read naked except for a cloth) went into a room with Jesus for a whole night saying he would do anything for him.

Neither of those stories put forth the right image and message so they were left out. Men who wanted women barefoot with Child left out any reference of head strong women,etc... i can go on but will spare you. The Council of Nicea eventually came up with a version of the new testament and old they could all be happy with and the rest were thrown away. So why do we have some of these stories now? Scrolls have been found hidden away as if someone did not want to destroy them out of respect so they hid them away and centuries later some one else found them.

And that is how the bible came to be...however, a English version took even longer to come forth because the church liked the power they held over common people and did not want to give it up. That story is filled with murder, torture, and burnings at the stake. The man most associated with an English version (that would become known as the King James version) was given a chance to recant and he would not so he burned at the stake. It was during this time that the Pilgrims existed and would eventually settle in Boston area. It was six months later that King George wanting both a divorce and piece of the new world kicked the Catholic church out and seized all there property in England and needing a bible he officially accepted the King James version.

I believe all versions of the Holy Bible are in perfect harmony. The main difference is the semantics various folk prefer. IE: Some versions say Jesus drank wine where others might say he drank grape juice.

The Law didn't come til the Israelites left Egypt and was handed down to Moses on Mount Sinai.

Randy seems to have a good handle on the bible.

Go with whatever version you are comfortable with, and, if you follow it's instructions, it will lead you to the same end the other versions will.

Thank you.