However, I have lots of other spiritual journeys I want to follow, and learn together. I hope as we explore more and further YOU each of you readers will share with each other your thoughts. I want your help to learn and stretch. My heart and soul. As I said before, we will disagree. Guess what? Disagreeing is good. Really!!! It shows we are not blind sheep and just saying yes yes yes.
Stories are how history is handed down from grandparent to grandchild, shaman to student, family to family. tribe to tribe, teacher to student , warrior to warrior, and so on..
We use story telling in almost all traditions, cultures and religions. Before the written word there were oral stories. Sometimes singing and chanting. "A picture tells a thousand words." So pictures tell stories. All of this is a way to share history.
History, including the Bible is full of stories. Through the ages stories we grow up with become beloved. We grow up with many similar stories and fairy tales, that teach morals and ethics,and we all have a favorite child hood book that for what ever reason strikes us as the best ever.
We never out grow it. Some thing about it reaches us in a way no other thing can. Mine is the Golden Egg Book. Its all about finding and making a life long friend. I even have the last page as a tattoo because it is so important to me.
Yet, the people who tell these stories, some times through the years lose words, words, change, at certian times scribes were hired to copy and they were uneducated, they basically just copied and had no idea what they copied.
People change stories to suit their needs . To help prove a point, to educate, or even to win an argument. Sadly I'm not just talking about children story books. I'm talking about the bible too. Here is where many will disagree and say the bible is always right, never changes. Yet we admit it is translated, some of the old testament was only for "then and them".I guess we want it both ways and it scares us not to have it both.
So lets explore together "stories " from the bible. The story, the history, the myth and ,more. We will come away with a few answers, lots of questions, and I'm sure different ideas. If we remember respect , listen, and open our hearts and minds to the possibilities..... it will be an amazing journey.
My new obsession is the Magi so I woulds like to start there.
Food for thought until tomorrow:
Where there only 3?
When did they get there?
What if some were women?
What if some were eunuchs?
Did the practice magic?
Just a few questions a have zillions? What are some of yous? I f you have some or some ides, PLEASE eave thoughts and questions in the comments section here or on m Facebook page.
(Disclaimer...I believe the bible is a holy book, i just don't believe in judging a book by its cover, or by the men that scream they know all it says from the pulpit.
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5 comments:
Magi as in 3 wise men? We assume there is only 3 because the gifts mentioned in the Bible...gold, frankincense and myrrh. The Bible does not say there were only 3 wise men. We can only speculate who they were. And seemingly they didn't arrive on the day of Christ's birth but sometime afterwards.
It is spoken in the Bible that if any man adds to the writings of the Bible plagues will come to them. Why would God not be powerful enough to keep at least one version of his words complete?
Aren't 'wisemen' and 'magi' the same thing? Sure, wisemen may connotate men, but that really doesn't bother me.
I thought the wisemen showed up on Epiphany? They saw a new, bright star in the sky and that was their epiphany- a revelation- that the new King had arrived. No one else knew baby Jesus was the King because he didn't LOOK like a king. Normally, kings looked like warriors and Jesus did not come as one. I thought the wisemen were strangers and NOT Jewish.
i'm commenting on my comments. i'm just writing what I'm personally learning in church for the first time. not saying it's right just what I'm learning and what I think.
I love these discussions!
This is an example of why you study for yourself instead of relying on what someone tells you. Tradition (church plays etc) has 3 wise men bringing 3 gifts and showing up the night of his birth (which is celebrated on the wrong day to begin with). So is epiphany. The Magi didn't show up a day, a week, or probably even a year after the birth. If you read directly from the scriptures, the time period is much longer.
I think we make a mistake when we take the scripture as actual history. Although there are some things in it that are historical, to expect it to be accurate and word for word is not logical. We know that even the earliest gospel was written at least 70 years after the death (not birth) of Christ, and that there is a significant question whether the authors are even the actual disciples. There is no where else in recorded history any proof that there was a census that brought Joseph and Mary to Bethleham and the "prophecy" of a virgin birth relied on a scripture that was mistranslated.
We do know that scribes added scripture along the way. The story of the woman caught in adultery was not in the oldest known manuscripts for instance. We also know that words were accidentally or intentionally mis translated or changed through the years. Now that scholars have several thousands of manuscripts to compare, we can see how this happened. Politically, we know that King James instructed his translators on how he wanted it to reflect certain beliefs and we know that Constantine had scholars sit down and figure out what Christians were going to believe so they would be more united, so they these MEN decided on the belief of the trinity and what books or gospels were accepted into the bible as we know it now.
I say all that to say that the wise men or Magi could have been anything. Even fictional. So I would not be surprised to find out there is much more to the Magi story than we have been told. I do not discount the bible as a spiritual guide, but I also want to know the TRUTH. I'm excited at this new study of early christianity and what it was like before politics became involved.
Keep the cool subjects coming!
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