Mid-April Updates and Notes

Hi everyone!

Tomorrow is our Mad Hatter Tea party - pretty stoked! Anyway, as Kia has been asking me for quite some time to take a Sunday off, I feel that tomorrow is probably the logical choice, seeing as how I will no doubt be very tired (and that is all) that morning.
Additionally, here are the Magnificent Ann's notes (thank you Ann, you really are magnificent!) from last week; Hope to see you soon!

Secular Sunday

April 19, 2019

Attendees:

·         Josh	·         Cheryl	·         Ann
·         Gina	·         Pam	·         John
·         Sean	·         Emily	·         James
·         Uzma	·         Antonio	·         Lyn
·         Tara	·         Lisa	·         Stephanie
·         Derek

Announcements:

April 20 2-11 pm – Mad Hatter Tea Party (Drinking Skeptically) at Sean’s

May 25 – Movie Night at Lyn's and Towel Day (Drinking Skeptically) (See Meetup site!)

April 14 – Hemant Mehta at Carrboro

Jim Hilton has resigned from his position with American Atheists so he won’t be coming in August

“Equal Means Equal” – movie screening at High Point Public Library 4/18 5:30 – 7:30

Discussion Notes:

Text Study!

Niels Bohr quote – “The fact that religions through the ages have spoken in images, parables, and paradoxes means simply that there are no other ways of grasping the reality to which they refer. But that does not mean that it is not a genuine reality. “

The Bible is a way of expressing things that are difficult to express in words. The difficulty makes it seem otherworldly or magical. Our hubris makes us feel that we should be able to understand everything. The wisest among us are usually the least confident.

The Bible is not a historical document but that does not mean that there isn’t truth in it. There are truths that are not facts. Making things binary does not permit this.

Richard Elliot Freeman’s documentary hypothesis is that the Bible is many texts woven into one.

“Meaning of Heb. uncertain” appears under a lot of the text in the Bible. It is especially problematic for words that appear only once so there is not an opportunity to figure it out.

Even when the text is not labeled as “uncertain” it doesn’t mean that the translation is good.

It is written in ancient Hebrew. It was an oral tradition before it was written down and canonized as the Torah. Translation to modern Hebrew is tough. Translation into other languages is even harder.\

Elohim or the 4 letter name of God. (I kind of lost the thread here)

Priestly texts – rules and prohibitions exist because whatever it was talking about was actually happening. Otherwise there is no need to prohibit. The text was contentious when it was written and is still contentious today.

We cannot approach the Bible as a new thing of which we know nothing because it is so woven into our culture.

Mythology  - reflects truth even though it isn’t factually true. Myth is not the opposite of truth.

To Josh, the Bible’s importance is as literature that helps to illuminate the human condition.

1)      Factual

2)      Written to control people

3)      It was inspired. By what? what is inspiration. Is it materialistic.

Dichotomies are a way of framing something so we can understand it. Oppositionality is kind of built in for us. But it isn’t useful all the time. Some things do not lend themselves to binary (yes/no, this/that) types of understanding.

Written for and about humans. Revelations in the text are not of the deity revealing a plan. They reveal things about us.

Writing things in someone else’s name was considered a good thing so attribution to someone “better” is common.

Jennifer Michael Hecht – Doubt, A History

The threat of punishment is an ongoing theme in scripture and in law. Our desire for justice is universal, if not in this life, then in the next.

The Bible is an attempt to impose/overlay order onto what was happening in the real world.

There was a lot of communication and sharing of stories between cultures in the ancient world (Hammurabi’s law code, flood myths)

*Ambiguity in texts is intentional. In translation, the ambiguity is lost. Example – blue has many meanings and associations.

*Internalog (sp?) (as opposed to dialog or monolog) – interal awareness of some critical thing that changes everything for you.  After life isn’t what happens to you after you die. It is this understanding that changes everything so that your life after is different. The world becomes a different place. Example: He-na-ni (Hebrew) – Here I am, can be read as “Oh, this is where I am.”

Erich Fromm – Escape from Freedom people don’t really want to be free.

Levels of the text

1)      Mythic

2)      Moral                                                    ---- which of these is central? None. All essential

3)      Metaphor

“In the beginning…” is one word in Hebrew. Can also be translated as “at the head” or by sound, as “in seeing the light”. It begins in the mind. Let’s start with this idea – light. It is an enlightenment text. Then quickly it becomes conflict between men.

Eden is a compound word – “until judgement”. Is it until we are capable of judgement (adulthood) or until we are judged? Either works in the Eden story.