by Haruo » Wed Nov 16, 2011 1:17 pm
Thanks, Abel. I will try to give this some serious thought and get back to you here. Now that I am unemployed I may have time for more thinking. But I think the fact that you raised the issue of homosexuality here is unfortunate, both because it encourages thread drift and because it suggests an agenda on your part that is not germane to your stated topic.
I will just say that the Bible also says that wearing mixed-fabric cloth blends (linen-wool? cotton-rayon?) is an abomination in God's sight, and that the Bible doesn't mention homosexuality per se. But I will agree that certain homosexual acts are among the things listed as abominations.
I haven't even seen where the Bible defines its own canon, so I have no way of knowing, based on the Bible, which books we ought to be referring to (though I know you and most folks here mean the 66-book post-Reformation canon, and that's mostly what I use, too, not because I think God has prescribed it, but because of habit and accessibility, and to avoid upsetting apple carts). God has preserved the 66-book canon, but He has also preserved the longer canons of the Greeks and Romans and Ethiopians, and he has preserved lots of ostensibly non-Christian scriptures. I am unwilling to state a priori that Paul's dictum "all scripture is inspired of God" is only true of Judeo-Christian writings that made the cut in the church, whether in the fourth century or the 16th. And I don't see how the Bible helps solve this dilemma.
I think the important inspiration is that which occurs in the reader or listener, moreso than that which occurred in the physical author. God is undoubtedly active at both ends.
Haruo = Leland Bryant Ross
—
—