Replies to post #3142 on Zeev's Turnips Talk Politics (ZTTP)

[sarai]

Hi goodluck! :)

It was suggested that I do "exhaustive research" too, but for my purposes that's not necessary. This Pope's interpretation of Scripture, as a Christian scholar, schooled in language, translation, and the evolution of language, is good enough for me. I trust the Pope is of moral conscience.

I am Jewish, but secular. I don't like the word "religious" because I think that's a subjective thing. Some of the most moral people I've known claim they are "not religious"... Having lived in New Jersey most of my life, I have as many Jewish as Christian [mostly Irish and/or Italian] friends. And I've taken many courses at Georgian Court College - Catholic, from which I benefited greatly. I can honestly say I have NEVER encountered the type of fundamentalist [evangelical?] ideology that I've seen posted here. Never. The overwhelming majority of Christians I've known have been warm and decent people. No doom. So this is kind of strange, and I am suspect of "religious" beliefs that tend to be divisive.

You are right about the necessity of separation of Church and State. We should all be concerned about the influence of the Evangelical or religious right in government. That type of influence goes against this Countries founding principals. Remember Ralph Reed [who was involved with the ENE fiasco, BTW], Newt and the Moral Majority?....

Regarding atheists, I once heard it said - "before you say there is no God, you better be darn sure there is no God." I would even apply the same to Jesus, because who am I to say, or "judge" or "know" for sure..... And I believe it's the essence of one's life that's important, and the rest is kind of "academic"... Anyway, that's my interpretation of the Book, but others take a much more literal view.....

Best regards, gl! :)

[Zeev Hed]

goodluck, talking about "translation" of holy writings. Sometime in the first few centuries after jesus birth, (or possibly before?), an assembly of religious Jewish leaders decided to translate the old testament to Greek. To make sure that the translation is perfect, they sat 120 Rabbis each in a completely isolated environment to complete the task, in the hope that comparison of the various translation would yield an accurate one. After 120 days, the work was completed, and low and behold, all the 120 translations were exactly the same. A cry of exclamation was all over the great hall where they assembled, "A miracle has occurred, a Miracle has occurred" cried the assemblage. Finally the Chief Rabbi managed to quite the assembly down and thundered: "no, that was not a miracle, it would have been a miracle if we all labored on this translation in one hall and did not come out with 120 different versions...."

Zeev