THE BIBLE

[Deleted]

Jordan Peterson often draws on the Bible in his lectures, and his perspective has reshaped the way I view this ancient text.

When I was younger, I dismissed it as little more than a tool used by men to control society. Now, I see it differently: a collection of humanity’s hard‑won wisdom, distilled into memorable stories designed to preserve and pass down insight across generations.

As I come across meaningful passages or interpretations, I’ll share them here—most will likely be drawn from Peterson’s work.

Here’s the first:

"The BIBLE isn't a BOOK,It's a Collection of BOOKS!"-Jordan Peterson with joe Rogan #shorts

------------------------------Jordan B. Peterson is a Canadian professor of psychology, clinical psychologist, YouTube personality, best-selling author and h...

youtube.com

 

[The_Doc_Man]

Before there were books, it was the duty of the village StoryTeller (or whatever name they used for the position) to tell stories of the culture and to teach the children of the next generation some of the wisdom and cultural rules. In those days there were no libraries because the earliest villages pre-dated writing. Cave art doesn't count as writing so much as it is a museum, in the sense that it was pictographic and more like a picture of some event without context. Like a picture of Napoleon at Waterloo, or Washington Crossing the Delaware. Images lacking context. If you knew the story, the pictures made perfect sense.

Kids in that era didn't have books, laptops, smart phones, or museums. The StoryTeller's job was to amuse, amaze, and instruct the restless kids who gathered around the nightly campfire. Of course, eventually the writing of words became a "thing" and at that point it became possible to transcribe the stories of the StoryTeller for posterity. But who knows how many variations had crept in to those many stories by the time of the transcription? Who knows how many generations preceded the transcriptions?

I agree with the "it's a collection of books" comment. Those books are like Aesop's Fables or Grimm's Faerie Tales in that they give insights into the wisdom of a culture told in a way that children could understand. I recognize the Bible as an attempt at capturing the originally oral history of a people. However, to me it is the history of a people who believed in God and thus captured their beliefs about God. Again, I have no problem with what they actually captured. There is no proof that the "divinity" beliefs were true, however.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

I am not equipped to debate this! I don't know enough about it, and I am relatively new to the ideas of Jordan Peterson. But I'll have a go and explain it the way I understand it. The stories in the Bible are not stories about something that happened, they are meta stories in the sense that they represent the human condition, the mistakes that humans make, and the knowledge of how to deal with and repair those mistakes. Knowledge which has been gathered, century after century and used to perfect the meta story, which is passed into Society. Each story will be refined and made suitable for each generation, each culture, but the essence of the story is what is transmitted by this meta format... As I alluded to at the beginning of this passage, I have probably got the wrong end of the Stick as usual!

Your answer is not inconsistent with my viewpoint. The meta-story long ago lost connection with any details of the "true" story (whatever it was). Cases in point: The story of Jesus in the Bible is strikingly similar in some of its details to the story of Horus (of Egypt) which pre-dates Jesus by about 1200 years, give or take a couple. The story of Noah's Flood parallels the flood from the time of Gilgamesh of Babylon, which was again much earlier than the Biblical version.

 

[Eugene-LS]

The Bible is a collection of Jewish fairy tales about how to behave toward those in authority.
Very handy for maintaining the "right order of things".

 

[Mike Krailo]

It's pretty hard to explain away how in the Book of Revelation it is explaining how things will end and now all of the sudden, there is this thing called digital currency. It's not hard to imagine a device on your hand or forehead that would make this final revelation more than just a story.

 

[Mike Krailo]

Jordan Peterson interprets it, giving it modern interpretation.

And yet he totally missed the other scenario that did not play out. Had they actually listened to God in the first place and not the snake, the snake would have never been a predator at all and nothing for them to have to deal with and they would have learned everything in good time. Instead, no more Eden and now they do have to deal with predators and all of the things God was taking care of for them including the garden itself. Hmmm, kind of like error handling in Access. What would we do without error handling?

Also there was no belief in God problem back then as God was actually with them.

 

[AccessBlaster]

With every reset, we seem to forget more and more of our past. We used to rely on the stars and gut feelings to help guide us. Sadly in the name of progress, we have intentionally dulled our own senses.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

Also there was no belief in God problem back then as God was actually with them.

Or at least they BELIEVED that He was there.

 

[Cronk]

Re the reference to the village story teller passing down the collective history to children (and future story tellers), it reminds me of the first world war British story of the message passed down the trench by one person after another to the next from the front line to head quarters. It started off as "send reinforcements, we're going to advance" and what was delivered to headquarters "send three and four pence, we're going to a dance". (The three and four pence meant three shillings and four pence in the pre decimal currency of the British pound shillings and pence and was the equivalent of about 17 pence or 0.17 pounds in the present currency)

 

[Mike Krailo]

Or at least they BELIEVED that He was there.

How then did they get the instruction not to eat of the fruit of that particular tree? Was it a figment of their imagination that told them? Come on man

 

[AccessBlaster]

The good news everything in the bible is true, the bad news is we misinterpreted who the creator is. Modern words had not been invented to describe what really happened.

What's more plausible, an old white guy in the sky determining the fate of mankind, or a little gray with a petri dish? If the little gray can traverse the universe at will surely they would have gene-splicing capabilities.

My only problem with this scenario is what about Jesus? I'm still working on that.

 

[Mike Krailo]

Re the reference to the village story teller passing down the collective history to children (and future story tellers), it reminds me of the first world war British story of the message passed down the trench by one person after another to the next from the front line to head quarters. It started off as "send reinforcements, we're going to advance" and what was delivered to headquarters "send three and four pence, we're going to a dance". (The three and four pence meant three shillings and four pence in the pre decimal currency of the British pound shillings and pence and was the equivalent of about 17 pence or 0.17 pounds in the present currency)

That thought crossed my mind as well, but you would be amazed at how these particular stories have actually stayed in tact over the generations (not in translation exactly). There are many more such writings that could have made the book a lot bigger. You could argue that words get twisted in translation, but we can simply go back to the original text in the original languages they were written and see for ourselves.

Our constitution in the US, for example, it's still the same constitution and still has the same meaning behind it but anyone can bastardize it's meaning and take it completely out of context for their own benefit.

In the first amendment:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

And yet many think this means that people who serve in the government or public schools or otherwise public entities cannot display their own faith publicly and must be silent about it. They site the "separation of church and state". This is not at all what the drafters of this amendment were saying at all. In fact, if you look at the different iterations and revisions of this amendment alone, you could clearly see they were talking about. No one denomination of Christianity could rule over all of the others and they did not want a monarchy of the church to come down on the people.

In Canada, they have already gone all in on CRT and putting into their institutions and making it a crime speak out against it. That's what a lack of first amendment and utter twisting of word meanings gets you. Sorry for going off topic, just sort of worked out that way.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

How then did they get the instruction not to eat of the fruit of that particular tree? Was it a figment of their imagination that told them? Come on man

How did they get the story of the Exodus when Israeli archaeologists have concluded that after years of thorough study, there never were Hebrew slaves in Egypt?

They got the instruction about that tree from a talking snake? Aw, come on, man!

Mike, I have no problem with your belief until you try to argue that it should be my belief. Raw logic suggests that even Genesis is wrong. Application of Occam's Razor tells us that much.

 

[Mike Krailo]

Doc, that's fine. It is also a fact well known how critical the moons placement is in our orbit around earth. A hair closer or further away and we wouldn't be here in the watercooler.

While occum's razor might make you feel better about your current view, it doesn't undermine truth contained in those nice little stories.

Some choose to believe we are all just biological meat bags that evolved out of primordial soup. Some believe they actually have a soul. Science cannot measure or see the soul so they conclude it dosen't exist. They just need to try harder. Just like those Israeli Archaeologists. That probably makes some feel comfortable with their current view. Feel free to believe what they tell you if it makes you feel good.

 

[Eugene-LS]

How did they get the story of the Exodus when Israeli archaeologists have concluded that after years of thorough study, there never were Hebrew slaves in Egypt?

There is no word "Egypt" in the original sources, just as there is no word "Slavery" - it was composed afterwards ...
In fact, the Bible has been rewritten so many times to please those in power that it's hard to understand it now.
...
Very handy!
You can interpret it either way as you like.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

A very good point, Eugene. History is written by those who prevailed. What would the history of Israel look like if the Amalekites had won?

 

[Cronk]

we can simply go back to the original text in the original languages they were written and see for ourselves.

But what about before the texts were written? And before science, incomprehensible things like natural events of flood and drought would be explained by supernatural forces such as god or gods or whatever whatever tribe/culture decided.

 

[conception_native_0123]

somehow I knew this discussion was going to rear its ugly head. and I'll stay out of it to make richard happy.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

To be honest, Adam, in the Watercooler you can be yourself. SOMETIMES your tech support savvy is a touch light, but here in the Watercooler, I know your feelings - and you know mine.

Talking about the Bible and going back to the original texts anyway... the Council of Nicea that "blessed" the Bible by choosing which books were legit and which were not TOTALLY voided any further claims to divinity. Unless God came down and lit up a burning bush for them and said, "These books are good, these other books are crap" (shades of Moses and the commandments), there was no legitimacy to any part of that process. And from the notes they left of their deliberations, all they did was pray over their choices and then make them anyway.

 

[Mike Krailo]

That L Ron Hubbard guy decided to write his stuff down on engraved metal plates. Just because it might be found sometime in the future does not define or redefine history. It might preserve his crazy religion though.

Some parts of history are better buried or destroyed so no one rediscovers the truth like maybe Atlantis. We have nuclear bombs but what they supposedly had destroyed their entire civilization. But maybe this is just all a made up story of no consequence.

A new movie just came out called The Adam Project on Netflix which deals with the eventual discovery of time travel and manipulation of worm holes. The whole plot was going back to the time prior to it's discovery and destroying that knowledge so it would never be discovered. Just watched that last night.

Christianity was written on the hearts of men and they wrote letters and accounts of what they witnessed to each other. It spread all over the world as they were commissioned to do so. Quibbling over perceived differences or anomalies doesn't change the overriding commission of Christians and the effect of such faith in the after life.