Sunday 8 October 2006

Today's Bible reading

Continuing our series of Sunday Bible readings. Today, reading from the little known but rewarding book of Habbakuk:
Drink thou also, and let thy foreskin be uncovered.--Habakkuk 2:16
Words to take to heart.

LINKS: The Book of Habbakuk - Skeptics Annotated Bible

RELATED: Religion, Humour, Nonsense

5 comments:

phil_style said...

PC, you are becoming quite the master at quoting out of context.

12 Woe to him who builds a town with blood, and establishes a city by iniquity!

13 Behold, isn't it of Yahweh of Armies that the peoples labor for the fire, and the nations weary themselves for vanity?

14 For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of Yahweh, as the waters cover the sea.

15 "Woe to him who gives his neighbor drink, pouring your inflaming wine until they are drunk, so that you may gaze at their naked bodies!

16 You are filled with shame, and not glory. You will also drink, and be exposed! The cup of Yahweh's right hand will come around to you, and disgrace will cover your glory. (NIV)

Anonymous said...

P-style,

You appear to be ignoring context.

1) This entire passage is referring to the notion that God will strike down the Chaldeans (Babylonians) for attacking Israel. But, in verse 1:6, God made them do just that! Classic sky-bully behaviour.

2)You are using modern traslations that gloss over the ambigous nature of the actual text. See PC's link for comparison. Clarity has been artifically imposed on your choice of biblical quote. This is particulary obvious since your section doesn't even contain PC's quoted section!

Some might say discussing the same edition of a given work might just be the very nature of keeping context...

Sean.

phil_style said...

BACKGROUND: Habakkuk begins as a frustrated prophet. He’s surrounded by violence, injustice strife and evil. Israel is going to pot and it seems God is just sitting on the sidelines watching it happen. He doesn’t seem to care. In his frustration Habakkuk cries out “How long 0 Lord, must I call out for help, but you do not listen.”( Habakkuk 1:2). Finally God answers, but it wasn’t the answer Habakkuk was looking for. God informs him that he’s going to raise up the Babylonians to punish Israel for her sin. This gives rise to Habakkuk’s second complaint. “How could you God? How could you raise up a nation like Babylon to destroy a nation more righteous than them. It’s not fair, it’s not the sort of thing a holy God’s supposed to do.” Again God’s answer to Habakkuk is to calm his fears. He assures him that what he’s going to do will be just. Israel will be punished for her sin, but so will the Babylonians (quote from Joe Mamma)

1.)Chapter1 1 and 2 point out that the Babylonians are already a 'sinful' nation (and thus deserving of 'punishment'). Chapter 1 previously mentions that God has chosen Babylon as his tool of reprimand against Israel. I like your use of the term 'sky bullying'. Call it what you will, you're entitled to believe whatever you like. There has been much written on the subject of whether or not this conversation between Hab. and God constitutes any kind of ‘fair’ justice. And this is precisely the discussion that Hab. is having with God with his “Complaints against God”.

2.) My point in providing a second translation was to do just that. As you state, the text is ambiguous, so therefore post a ½ line of it on a Blogsite is a pretty poor effort at conveying any meaning at all, unless of course PC was just trying to be funny, in which case, I shall murmur a wee chuckle. I deliberately didn’t include PC’s quote because it was already on the post for all to see, what’s the point in doubling it up?

cvhevy

Anonymous said...

Why are discussions about religion so incredibly boring? Is it because people who discuss religion can't think for yourselves?

phil_style said...

And here I was thinking it was a discussion about textual interpretation . .