A biblical query

[Stitch]

I'm a little puzzled.

Exodus 20:4,5 states

04: Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.

05: Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;

So does this mean "No statues" or just "no statues that aren't god / JC / the holy spirit"?

I suppose Roman Catholics would claim they don't actually bow down before statues of Mary and the Saints, but they do seem to give them nod. How do they get round that one?

 

[Nogbad]

It is an odd one. The Orthodox Jews and Muslims tend to view that as no representation period. That is why so much Islamic decoration is just abstract. Christians have to a large extent ignored it and went in for iconography from an early period. This extends to JC, Mary, Angels and an awful lot of Saints.

 

[Loss Leader]

I'm a little puzzled.

Exodus 20:4,5 states


So does this mean "No statues" or just "no statues that aren't god / JC / the holy spirit"?

I suppose Roman Catholics would claim they don't actually bow down before statues of Mary and the Saints, but they do seem to give them nod. How do they get round that one?

Having been raised Jewish, I have always found christian (and expecially Catholic) iconography particularly unappealing. It seemed to me to directly and clearly violate the commandment against graven images. God is an abstraction to be contemplated, not a picture to be looked at.

Studying the history of christianity, it becomes clear that idol worship was brought into the religion by the mass of pagans who made up the bulk of converts to christianity. Very few Jews converted and Jewish concepts and practices did not have much impact upon the religion.




N.B. Nothing above should be taken to mean that I currently subscribe to the beliefs of the Jewish religion or find any one religion superior to any other.

 

[Tricky]

What, after all, is a crucifix but a graven image? This is yet another one of those things that Christians seem to be able to rationalize away, along with amassing great wealth, as specifically proscribed by Jesus.

I've noticed that almost all Catholic churches have a crucifixion scene somewhere in them. In Hispanic Catholic churches, this image quite often is incredibly gory and brutal, leading one friend of mine to refer to such places by the general term, "Church of the Gooey Death".

 

[Darat]

Having been raised Jewish, I have always found christian (and expecially Catholic) iconography particularly unappealing. It seemed to me to directly and clearly violate the commandment against graven images. God is an abstraction to be contemplated, not a picture to be looked at.

...snip...

And quite a few other Christian denominations also have this prohibition - the lot that I was brought up in (Methodist) objected very strongly to "graven" images including crucifixes (those are the crosses with the little man on for those not up on Christian terminology), indeed even crosses in the chapels weren't prominently displayed.

Today I still find such iconography quite, well creepy, whether this is a remnant of my religious upbringing or just because I watched a lot of horror movies as a kid I don't know!

 

[Hokulele]

As Nogbad mentioned, it is not just "graven images" but pretty much any artistic representation (paintings, mosaic, etc.). The justification that I have heard is that the images themselves are not being worshipped, but the entity behind them.

 

[Lothian]

I was brought up in (Methodist) objected very strongly to "graven" images including crucifixes
Today I still find such iconography quite, well creepy, whether this is a remnant of my religious upbringing or just because I watched a lot of horror movies as a kid I don't know!

Lets do a test.
Methodist's also object to Alcohol.

Does this picture bring out any strange feelings ? If not I guess it is the films.

 

[Gord_in_Toronto]

"Explain the Bible". Isn't that an oxymoron?

 

[A Christian Sceptic]

I just read a great book about Early Christian Art.

Understanding Early Christian Art by Robin Ma Jensen

It's a textbook though by an Art Historian so not light reading.

As an aside though - in these threads on this forum I am finding it more and more a theme that Athiests seem to want Christians to subscribe to some sort of legalistic religion. Christianity as practiced seems to be too flexible or something. And that if one of the legal rules they expect Christians to follow is not followed, then the whole shebang must be invalidated. Is this a result of people's rigid experiences with Christianity before they were Athiests? Or simply confirmation bias amongst each other about the hypocrisy of Christians and and therefore the falsehood of Christianity?

 

[X]

I think it has more to do with the tendency of some (not all) Christians to demand we live by "God's Law", whilst simultaneously being either ignorant of said law or hypocritical towards it, rather then an expectation among atheists that Christians adhere to a rigid set of doctrines.

And for the OP: It seems to me that the OT is quite clear about condemning images/idols. My understanding is that it is something to do with trying to create a large gulf between the emerging monotheism and pagan polytheistic traditions.

 

[wolfgirl]

I think it has more to do with the tendency of some (not all) Christians to demand we live by "God's Law", whilst simultaneously being either ignorant of said law or hypocritical towards it, rather then an expectation among atheists that Christians adhere to a rigid set of doctrines.

That's exactly it. We don't say that xians have to follow any sort of rules, but xians themselves seem to be so set upon following the bible, yet they will pick and choose what they want to follow and what they don't, proclaiming that they don't believe that god meant they really should do whatever thing it is they don't want to do. It seems to us (atheists) that if the bible is the infallible word of god, it's either all right or all wrong.

Off-topic: [X], where are you in Manitoba? I grew up in the North End of Winnipeg.

 

[Beerina]

Exodus 04: Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.

Keep in mind the Bible's cosmology is that we exist as a pocket in a 3-dimensional space filled with the waters of chaos, with the land below and the solid "firmament" above.

Knowing that, one wonders what things exist in "the water under the earth". We do know of two such creatures: Leviathan, the great chaos dragon, and Behemoth, the great chaos beast. Yahweh slew both of them, according to Psalms and maybe some other spots.

So please. No models of the great creatures Yahweh slew in early battles for dominance of this 3-D fluidic space.

Have some r35pec4, p33pz, for the wonderful things He's done 4 u!

 

[A Christian Sceptic]

That's exactly it. We don't say that xians have to follow any sort of rules, but xians themselves seem to be so set upon following the bible, yet they will pick and choose what they want to follow and what they don't, proclaiming that they don't believe that god meant they really should do whatever thing it is they don't want to do. It seems to us (atheists) that if the bible is the infallible word of god, it's either all right or all wrong.

Right here you are contradicting yourself.

You say We don't say that xians have to follow any sort of rules but then go on to say that Christians 1) can't pick and choose what they want to follow and what they don't, 2) Christians have to believe the bible is the infallible word of god, and 3) that the infallible means it's either all right or all wrong and apparently 4) Christians need to agree with you that what is all right or all wrong is the same as what you think it is.

 

[Soapy Sam]

As an aside though - in these threads on this forum I am finding it more and more a theme that Athiests seem to want Christians to subscribe to some sort of legalistic religion. Christianity as practiced seems to be too flexible or something. And that if one of the legal rules they expect Christians to follow is not followed, then the whole shebang must be invalidated. Is this a result of people's rigid experiences with Christianity before they were Athiests? Or simply confirmation bias amongst each other about the hypocrisy of Christians and and therefore the falsehood of Christianity?

It's spelled "atheist" (one of many exceptions to the "i before e" rule) and does not require a capital (at least I see no need for one).

I can't answer for others here. My only expectation of Christians , Muslims or any other religious persons is that they are consistent in their proclaimed morality and their actual behaviour. I have been frequently disappointed in this.
My hope for them is that they would abandon a worldview which, so far as I can see, bears no relation to reality.
I think my attitudes are common on a predominantly atheist sceptics forum.
I doubt it's possible that you will find absolutely no anti-religious bias here.
I would comment that I have found religious websites far more censorious of atheist views than JREF is of religious ones.

 

[Lothian]

I am interested in which rules Christians think should be followed and which rules should be ignored.

I am particularly interested in how different Christian Sects differ in their opinions and how the same sect changes its position over time.

My opinion is that the rules are set by men and when men want the rules changed their ‘God’ miraculously has a sudden change of heart.

I wouldn’t say that God’s ever changing opinion to fit in with man’s wishes invalidates Christianity but it does raise the question as to whether God is ‘adding value’ to the process.

 

[A Christian Sceptic]

It's spelled "atheist" (one of many exceptions to the "i before e" rule) and does not require a capital (at least I see no need for one).

There was a whole thread about that. My statement is the same - if "i" gets pushed first before "e" as I type - then "i" appears first.

I can't answer for others here. My only expectation of Christians , Muslims or any other religious persons is that they are consistent in their proclaimed morality and their actual behaviour. I have been frequently disappointed in this.

Why? Unless they're demanding certain behavior from you as a fellow believer what's it matter whether they do what they say?

I think my attitudes are common on a predominantly atheist sceptics forum.
I doubt it's possible that you will find absolutely no anti-religious bias here.

I've never expected that.

 

[A Christian Sceptic]

I am interested in which rules Christians think should be followed and which rules should be ignored.

Why do you think Christianity is simply about following rules?

 

[wolfgirl]

Right here you are contradicting yourself.

You say We don't say that xians have to follow any sort of rules but then go on to say that Christians 1) can't pick and choose what they want to follow and what they don't, 2) Christians have to believe the bible is the infallible word of god, and 3) that the infallible means it's either all right or all wrong and apparently 4) Christians need to agree with you that what is all right or all wrong is the same as what you think it is.

I'm not saying any of those things. I'm saying that's what I hear xians say. They will say on the one hand that the bible is the infallible word of god (and yes, if it's infallible, then that means that it's all correct). Then they will say that they don't necessarily agree with everything in it. Well, if god is infallible, and the bible is his word, how can some of it be wrong? One of these statements has to be incorrect:

1. God is infallible.
2. The bible is the word of god.
3. The bible is inerrant.

Please note that "4. All of the above" cannot logically be an option if you choose not to accept every single thing the bible says as fact. This is not my rule, it's not an atheist rule, it's a rule of logic.

 

[Nogbad]

I just read a great book about Early Christian Art.

Understanding Early Christian Art by Robin Ma Jensen

It's a textbook though by an Art Historian so not light reading.

As an aside though - in these threads on this forum I am finding it more and more a theme that Athiests seem to want Christians to subscribe to some sort of legalistic religion. Christianity as practiced seems to be too flexible or something. And that if one of the legal rules they expect Christians to follow is not followed, then the whole shebang must be invalidated. Is this a result of people's rigid experiences with Christianity before they were Athiests? Or simply confirmation bias amongst each other about the hypocrisy of Christians and and therefore the falsehood of Christianity?

I think it would be fair to say that there are a number of Christian traditions such as a Wee Free who would be distinctly uncomfortable in a RC Church confronted with statues of Mary (mainly because one would have had to hit him on the head and tied him up to get him in there in the first place).

I think that it is a given that the RC, Anglican and Orthodox Churches, the vast majority of Christians, do not think that verse is an issue for them. There are some denominations, however, who do have an issue and order themselves accordingly. So in that respect the different denominations are consistent within themselves and are not being hypocritical but there is an element of discord between the denominations over the issue.

 

[Crossbow]

I'm a little puzzled.

Exodus 20:4,5 states


So does this mean "No statues" or just "no statues that aren't god / JC / the holy spirit"?

I suppose Roman Catholics would claim they don't actually bow down before statues of Mary and the Saints, but they do seem to give them nod. How do they get round that one?

The Catholic Church still shows a great deal of its pagan roots.

Use of incense,
the formal power structure,
the concept of demon possession,
the concept that one needs a trained priest to understand God,
and of course the various icons, saints, angels, holy relics, and other such things.

Ugh! It does not make much sense to me either and I doubt that anyone has ever really figured out that 'Holy Spirit' thing (even though they have been trying for several centuries now).