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JanesOpinion -- that's very simular to the numbers that I have heard
I've heard 70 million total used a nunber of times. You must admit that there are a few caveates though. Secret house churches? To your credit you used a broad enough range (40-70 million) to cover this but there is one peculiarity about foreign missionary endevours that no one seems to mention. Any person that does not live on North American soil who owns a bible, is counted as a Christian by those wanting to insist that Christianity is sweeping the globe. Where many protestant Christians do not consider Catholics as Christian, I can say that of the numbers you mention, at least a few million of them are Catholics. And surprise surprise, if you ask the Catholics how many Christians there are in China, they will say much the same as the numbers we have discussed. I think there is some creative accounting going on here?
posted by
gomedome
on February 18, 2006 at 10:30 PM
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Gome, not sure you'll see this, but in case you return . . .
according to a BBC article, there are about 10 million Chinese Christians who go to the official State sanctioned churches, and between 40 and 70 million who worship in secret house churches. Still a relatively small number compared with the 1 billion+ now in China; however, from what I have read that number is growing.
posted by
JanesOpinion
on February 18, 2006 at 8:01 PM
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There are two models of time that I know of. "God's arrow," and "Cyclical Time." God's arrow is a metaphor because the flight of an arrow has a beginning (a release: creation) and an end (apocalypse or armageddon). Cyclical time privileges the reoccurrence of patterns over beginnings and ends, and I tend to prefer this way of looking at things. Even the Big Bang I think was the result of a previous universe collapsing on itself, and imploding until it had nothing left to do but explode and expand. It's all there in breathing: expansion, contraction. When the universe starts to contract again, will time move backwards?
Funnily enough, Apocalypse doesn't mean "end" so much as "unveiling."
posted by
Trevor_Cunnington
on February 16, 2006 at 5:35 AM
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JanesOpinion --- let's talk about this for a minute
In my statement that you could not prove that the Chinese hemisphere was bursting out in happy little yellow Christians, one glaring reality exists......I cannot disprove it. Such is the nature of the claim, someone thought long and hard at Christian propaganda headquarters before they released this classic. A depiction of something that may or may not be real and can never be disproven but is also semi-believable as a bonus. What it is however, is a yarn that is being woven into a one sided story. There is no one saying if other major world religions are making the same headway with their expansions into this territory. There is no one presenting the Chinese side of the story either. There is also no mention of what is compelling the Chinese to react the way you have depicted. It is clearly a one sided, shiny happy tale for a multitude that must have them. Comparitive stastistics would be very interesting in this case.
posted by
gomedome
on February 15, 2006 at 9:02 PM
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Ha ha, Gome, just go ahead and call me a Bible thumper . . .
I just could not help myself . . . .
I do stand by the rest of what I said though (uh, I think it was the middle paragraph on my last comment). Actually, I stand by ALL of what I said but, like you said, the last would sound like propaganda to you, and we cannot have that!
posted by
JanesOpinion
on February 15, 2006 at 5:59 PM
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JanesOpinion -- whoa slow down - trying to bop me over the head with
Christian propaganda gets a bit off topic. Have you ever been to China and seen these things of which you claim to be true? My point is that you are taking someone's word for this, therefore prefacing such claims with "I've heard tell . ." may be prudent. I've never disputed the notion of the bible being important to many people, but unfortunately that is not what we were discussing. To say that: "the bible is a work for all people of all times" are really just nice sounding words. The reality is that it's relevancy was much greater to many more people, or a much more significant portion of the populace, just a few hundred years ago. It has been losing it's relevancy in real terms ever since. Where at one time, a full 40% of the globe were adherants to Christian faiths, these days the numbers barely break 30%. The population explosion of recent decades has increased actual numbers but it is not growth in the true sense. It seems we hear a lot of stories these days of far off places experiencing growth that cannot be confirmed
posted by
gomedome
on February 14, 2006 at 7:58 PM
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But but but but but . . . .
Gome wrote "If it is necessary for the reader of the bible to adjust to the perceptions of the people during the time that it was written, then two more glaring inconsistancies present themselves. First, is it likely that a divinely inspired series of manuscripts would be subject to this limitation? Is not this word of God for all people, for all times? Secondly, the adjustment to these ancient perceptions is not possible for all people, thereby rendering the bible redundant to a large segment of those who claim it to be the foundation of their religious precepts. "
The Bible is for all people in all times. The amazing thing about it is that you don't need a complete understanding of the cultural context to benefit from it, to experience its life changing capability. Hundreds of thousands -- OK, millions -- have read and understood the message of the Bible and their lives forever changed as a consequence. However, to get the most out of it, I think it DOES help to understand the cultural context in which it was written. Such an understanding makes the Bible come to life even more! But is this vitally necessary? A big fat NOPE!
Do you know that in China there are people there who only have scraps of the Bible -- one page of a Chinese Bible -- and NO ONE FORCING IT DOWN THEIR THROATS yet that one page has been all that was needed to forever change lives. Chinese culture totally different than Jewish culture yes? But the message is understood and accepted. Gome, they are desperate for Bibles, hungry. They will risk death if need be to get their hands on a Bible. Of course you and the majority of North Americans don't hear of this because Communist China does not wish for you to KNOW this. But it's true.
posted by
JanesOpinion
on February 14, 2006 at 7:13 PM
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JanesOpinion - Okay, I can buy that but >>>>>>
If it is necessary for the reader of the bible to adjust to the perceptions of the people during the time that it was written, then two more glaring inconsistancies present themselves. First, is it likely that a divinely inspired series of manuscripts would be subject to this limitation? Is not this word of God for all people, for all times? Secondly, the adjustment to these ancient perceptions is not possible for all people, thereby rendering the bible redundant to a large segment of those who claim it to be the foundation of their religious precepts.
posted by
gomedome
on February 14, 2006 at 6:07 PM
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OK you three, let me add my two cents, and pull a comment I wrote
from my own comments section and add it here. Here goes . . . .
"Kooka you've got me there! I do believe that all of the Bible is true, BUT at the same time, to better understand the Bible one has to get into the Jewish mindset. As one Christian theologian/historian (who has spent years studying with Rabbis) has said, it is very helpful, when studying the Bible and/or Jewish history, to realize that the Jews of the OT and NT were very practical and often spoke in pictures or parables, using examples that the people would be very familiar with during that time. Which is why the full meaning of some of Jesus' parables can be a challenge to understand today but were very clear to the people back then -- because Jesus used the lingo and examples and "visuals" of that day.
So yes, I do believe that all of the Bible is the inspired word of God and is 100% believable; however, that said, I also know that to better understand the Bible, I need to understand the word pictures God used as examples -- that were very clear to the people back then, but a little more challenging for us."
So hello guys, but let's keep in mind the "lingua franca" of the day. It's different than what we know today, so it helps to get into the culture and understand the idioms and such used then. This does NOT detract from the integrity of the Bible.
posted by
JanesOpinion
on February 14, 2006 at 5:47 PM
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on top of that
it was probably written at a time when the descendants of Abraham, both Israelites (Jews are only a small portion) and other descendants (Arabs [descendants of Ishmael], other neighoring middle east peoples) wer a considerable number.
the author did as some Christians do in skewing the figures -- including several groups with whom they basically disagreed in their figures.
posted by
Xeno-x
on February 14, 2006 at 6:52 AM
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kooka_lives - the thing that amazes me about this subject,
and with no intention of picking on JanesOpinion, is how often those who would want to literally translate the Bible and insist that it is the inerrant word of God, have to step back and say that some of the passages need to be taken as analogous or figurative. As you pointed out in your comments, where do the analogies begin and end? Sorta takes the thumpability out of the bible doesn't it?
posted by
gomedome
on February 13, 2006 at 9:13 PM
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gomedome
That was one of the directions I had planned to go with this topic.
So much of these kind of quotes from the Bible just back up the simple fact that you CAN NOT take the Bible literally, even if you believe it to be the 'Word of God' and something to live by. There has to be such limitations in it due to man's limitations of the time and there has to be figurative messages. It does not work in the least if you take it fully literally.
Believers need to see that and come to terms with it in order to use the Biblical concepts better. I think a more open mind towards the Bible by believers, would be a great first step in them coming to terms with reality.
The basic idea of the post was to show how foolish it is to take the Bible fully literally. That really is one of the weakest aspects of most beliefs based on the Bible. They do not understand the need to see parts as figurative or limited in perspective
.
posted by
kooka_lives
on February 13, 2006 at 8:20 PM
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kooka_lives - I have another take on this particular phrase
concerning the stars and sand etc. It is simply a human limitation of the time period. People back in the time that the scriptures were written had no idea that the number of stars was incomprehensible. The world was also much smaller from the perspective of those living in the Mesapotamian regions (where Abraham is from). With this limited perspective, the number of the grains of sand may not be fully understood to be an unknowable number. The point here is that this clearly demonstrates the limitations of the collective human knowledge base during the time of writing......is this possible in the word of God?
posted by
gomedome
on February 13, 2006 at 7:39 PM
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And Janes
Here is the same reply I left for you there-
So we are then not to take everything in the Bible literally? Now I am getting confused. I thought we were not allowed to look at any aspects of the Bible as being figurative.
Could the 'Seven' days be figurative as well? Or the whole idea of the book of Revelation? Or so many other stories in the Bible that if they were figurative they suddenly would make a whole lot more sense?
How do you know what to take literal and what to take figuratively?
Thank you for helping me build up to my point.
Although I will add this time, you said " So I think that here God meant that Abraham's descendants would be so many you could not count the number!" Which gives us even more time, since we can actually keep a better count on the population of man than we ever have been able to in the past. So it will be a long, long time before we get to a point where we would get too high to be able to keep track of them all.
posted by
kooka_lives
on February 13, 2006 at 6:47 PM
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Kooka, I'll leave the same comment I left on my own post . . .
"In my humble opinion, I think the comment regarding the stars and grains of sand is a metaphor and/or the common Jewish use of speaking in pictures. They are/were (at least back then) very visual and used examples that people could relate to. So I think that here God meant that Abraham's descendents would be so many you could not count the number!" --
(But still glad I could help get the creative juices flowing!)
posted by
JanesOpinion
on February 13, 2006 at 6:37 PM
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