Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Blankinship, Benjamin" <bla26 AT co.henrico.va.us>]

> This is what I mean by denying the plain meaning of the 
> biblical text to get it to conform to some preconceived
> notion of what God is like, or what the world is like. An
> all good god can't make darkness or evil, no matter what
> the biblical text says, so let's just make it say something 
> different from what it actually says.

Rather than arguing my original point (which is off-topic, as well as
relatively trivial), let me say that I agree wholeheartedly with this
excerpt from yours. That's why I started reading this list. I have a
pretty good idea of the major streams of Christian thought, but I find
Jewish perspectives extremely helpful, because many Christians will
twist the Hebrew scriptures to force them into alignment with later
("new testament") writings. Having been educated entirely in the
Christian tradition, I don't really know where that tradition is
faithful to the Hebrew scriptures and where it manipulates them. But I
certainly want to learn the difference.

> ...   the Talmudist, whoever it was who said "These and 
> these are the words of the living God," even tho they 
> disagree.

Those are always there areas where we learn the most, aren't they?

-- 
Ben B