Cherry Picking

There has been a story on digg about how the bible has been reclassified "due to its sexual and violent content". 800 people in Hong Kong found in indecent, and I am sure a few more do. Some parts of it are not for children to read. A few weeks ago in bible study we looked at Ezekiel 16 and apparently C.H Spurgen said "A minister could scarcely read this chapter in public" and there are many other bits that in old Jewish tradition were banned for young readers, due to its content (like Song of Songs). Anyway going through the digg forums on a religious topic is always good. I like to know what others think. Below is one that I would like to comment on. After 4 hours it has gotten 27 diggs. (edit: and after 14 hours 95 people dugg the comment).

Diggers are not necessarily anti-religion. Many are more anti-hypocrisy though. Religion has many very good aspects. It's the people who distort those points for their own benefits and traditions - that is what people are against.

Personally, I consider the Bible as a terribly disorganized collection of stories chosen by men who wanted to further their own beliefs and traditions. The church cherry picked which books belong in the bible and buried and/or destroyed anything that didn't fit their narrow interpretations. The only thing that really should have relevance to a Christian is the words of Jesus, but instead they prefer to focus on the words of men, not their Lord.

Jesus would not be hated even today, as he was a moral tolerant and understanding person. His words make sense. Others just misinterpret and contradict themselves and mislead his followers.

I love how this post on one hand says religion has good points, but then on the other hand goes on to say that the basis of the religion that is in question was organised by men pushing an agenda; except for the bits about Jesus, those bits should be listened to - over and above the cherry picking, cause Jesus was a nice guy, his words makes sense.

Now I have no specific idea on how the Old Testament was formed. I know that the first five books were there first and then a few hundred years later some more were added and then some more hundred years passed and more books were added. But with the New Testament the main reason why book were discarded were because they were written too late after the events had taken place to be deemed reliable.

I just listened to a talk by Mark Driscoll who commented on the nice guy image of Jesus, and how he found it hard to worship a guy that you could beat up. Mark denies the idea that Jesus was only a nice guy who was tolerant of everyone. And besides that if Jesus was such a nice and tolerant guy why did the religious people of the day want to kill him?

Jesus taught that if you hate someone you are murdering them, if you look at a women lustfully you are committing adultery and if you divorce, (except for the reason of your partner being unfaithful), you are again committing adultery. All that is in just one chapter. What about the message that Jesus had that he was going to rise again from the dead and that we are to give up our own lives for him, if not he will be ashamed of us? And what about the tolerant and understanding view that Jesus is the only way to get into heaven? And these ideas are only from 3 passages.

If Jesus was here today I really wonder if people would like what he had to say. I know some of his followers who say the same things that he did who are not liked.