Germany: Gender-Neutral Bible in the works. Release 2016

[Wildtree]

Weeeeeeeeell, from my experience it depends. There are some HARDCORE Christians in Germany here and there. (I'm looking at you Bavaria)

True... but you'd have to look to the North as well. All the way up there you find as many fanatics.
There appears - seems logic too - to be a connection to the elements.. The more the people have to deal with them, the more they believe in a higher force..

[Kalis]

Probably one of the most important pieces of literature that was ever written and will be written by mankind.
It is basically thousands of years of history in one book. Religion aside, this book is able to tell us things we would otherwise never know about our history, because it was simply forgotten or erased.

As a collection of ancient Middle Eastern stories, the Bible is a great piece of work, not of the calibre of Ancient Greek texts such as Homer in their richness and complexity (at least in my opinion), but still interesting and important nonetheless.

However, as a historical document it is virtually worthless, there are so many inaccuracies and fudging that it is a historical record of wishful thinking rather than reality. Homer is even more worthless in that regard, there are definitely some truths there, but it's a hard slog to uncover them and glean anything of historical value.

Compare it to say Herodotus and it is equal with story telling (that is as a record of stories, I'm not comparing their modern importance to people), but nowhere near as useful in regards to history (and Herodotus was fond of exaggeration himself, as well as a little loose when it came to fact checking).

Now, if you compare it to Thukydides, then the Bible wins on story telling (his was a very 'dry' style and he wasn't particularly interested in the supernatural), but it isn't even in the same league when comparing them for historical accuracy and it looks like what it is, i.e. a book (or more accurately, books) written for a particular audience that didn't want to hear history as we understand it. They didn't want to read the facts about some people of a relatively unimportant realm who didn't do much in the scheme of things, so they exaggerated a lot and made up even more, they almost certainly weren't even intended as an accurate historical record, whereas Thukydides was and wanted to say what actually happened (at least as he could work out what happened).

Writers like Xenophon, Arrian, Josephus and Caesar, are great works for their value to the historical record, even if they have varying degrees of bias, but others like the Bible and Homer are more useful from a literary point of view for their recording of stories, for historical usefulness they are trumped by archaeological findings and other records, though sometimes they can add a bit of detail even if it is unreliable.

[Pterodactylus]

And... who cares? You can't just change literature to fit whatever is politically correct right now.

Tell that to all of history.

[Deleted]

The only problem I can see with this is that it might try to white wash parts of the bible. The bible is not a gender neutral book to start with. It does not address men and women equally. It specifically shows that women and worth less then men.

We need the bible to remain the disgusting mess of cruelty, hatred and unequal treatment that it is, because we need more atheists.

[StayTuned]

Are they seriously trying to change an ancient, misogynistic scripture into something which fits today's social norms?

Might as well erase 80% of the book.

[Sky High]

Are they seriously trying to change an ancient, misogynistic scripture into something which fits today's social norms?

Might as well erase 80% of the book.

lol my thoughts exactly. how is it even possible to be gender neutral when it comes to handling proper.. er I mean your wife?

[Doctor Amadeus]

They going to edit out Martin Luther's hatred for Jews?

[Wildtree]

They going to edit out Martin Luther's hatred for Jews?

Obviously not, since they change the bible, not Luther's other works lol

But it's actually really a good question by itself.
Luther died at the age of 53. Normal age for the time being. (1483-1546)
The interesting thing with that is, up until he was already 43, he was everything but Anti-Jews.
He made strong statements in their favor.
It wasn't until 1536 when he started to change his views rather radically.

[Xilurm]

What's the point of this exactly? I mean, either God is real or not lol. You can't change something which defines God himself. Makes the book totally worthless.

If God treats women as inferior to men, that new book won't change the fact. Who thought this was actually a smart thing?

[Doctor Amadeus]

Obviously not, since they change the bible, not Luther's other works lol

But it's actually really a good question by itself.
Luther died at the age of 53. Normal age for the time being. (1483-1546)
The interesting thing with that is, up until he was already 43, he was everything but Anti-Jews.
He made strong statements in their favor.
It wasn't until 1536 when he started to change his views rather radically.

Haha, yeah, I am imagining that would make things a little uncomfortable.

[Twoflower]

Will they also change "if your daughter has sex before marriage, stone her to death"
into "if your daughter or son etc..." ?

[Elim Garak]

While we are on the topic about jesus.

[Symphonic]

Every bible translation is not 100% correct. I believe the bible to be the word of God, as far as it is translated correctly. Of course there will be things miscommunicated, or translated incorrectly which in turn cause confusion. It's funny that people get so mad when I tell them that I believe in the bible, but also state that it is not perfect due to translation errors. It's equally as funny that people think God literally wrote the bible, when in fact, it is written by Prophets, who are people, who by nature are not perfect, and therefore can make mistakes.

[Masark]

Why is jesus using a communist RPG-7?

[dextersmith]

They don't want "historic truth"? Gender was huge.

[Lupinemancer]

It's an important piece of literature. In fact, any serious story teller would actually read it.

Important? yea right, it's also important talk to yourself in puplic, or kick the biker in front of you.
Seriously there is nothing important about that book. Other then being used to light a fire.

[Waaldo]

Lol at the bible being changed.... As if the bible isn't supposed to be a sacred religious text that talks about events predating humans. But fuck God, let's make it more gender neutral. I would say this sufficiently proves God isn't real, because if he was he would smite down these twats long before they had a chance to feminize it.

Seems to me like these Germans are about to make some serious bank. People are actually going to buy this shit, all because religion.

[zorkuus]

I support this. The more you change scripture it's further evidence it was bs to begin with.

[Muzjhath]

Important? yea right, it's also important talk to yourself in puplic, or kick the biker in front of you.
Seriously there is nothing important about that book. Other then being used to light a fire.

Except that it's a cornerstone for almost all western literature. To understand western literature from an outside culture you pretty much have to have read (at least parts) of the bible.
Same as to get Chinese literature you ought to have a grasp of Taoism.

[wowaccounttom]

so how does that work...????

everyone in the bible has no gender and those mentioned become an "it"?