Even a cursory examination of the Bible should be enough to convince anyone that the Bible actually preserves a wide diversity of opinion and the ideological positions of its authors span the spectrum from extreme conservatism (even to the point of being reactionary) to radicalism; it spans the spectrum from extreme ‘right wing' ideology to advocating ‘communism', something easily demonstrated when the synoptic gospels are compared. The Bible does not present a single point of view (the consistent viewpoint of God) but rather is a smorgasbord of ideology and theology, a diverse and mixed bag of doctrine and even contains inconsistent and contradictory presentations of what purports to be history (on examination ‘history' in the Bible proves to be polemic, something I will demonstrate on this site). As such the Bible reveals itself to be a record of human experience, human tradition, and human opinions about the nature of God and reality. One of my first purposes in constructing the Bible pages on this site is to demonstrate conclusively that the preceding statements are true. It is a matter of fact, not opinion, and can be proven to the satisfaction of anyone who maintains an open mind on the matter, simply by examining the Biblical text. To state that this is the case, and to prove that it is true, is not to declare the Bible worthless, unless we wish to declare all human experience to be invalid. People experienced things, and they shared their experiences, but they also interpreted their experiences, and it is these interpretations that are so often the source of the contradictions on the pages of the Bible.

      After having established that the Bible is a record of varying human experiences and the differing and competing traditions that were born from these experiences, I am then left to wonder just what place the Bible has a rule of faith, and this question is not one that can be simply answered. I continue to struggle to come up with a solution. Personally I am not convinced that finding such a solution is really necessary for the righteous will live by faith and this describes a simple relationship of trust. The Bible was never at the center of my faith, since my faith was born of a particular set of experiences I had, starting when I was twelve (I heard a voice coming out of nowhere that announced my grandfather's death, and this was followed by even more unusual experiences. Consult the link below to my site summary page if you are interested in more information.) Because my faith was born of my own personal experience, coming up with solutions to the problems the Bible presents is not my very top priority. I will not rise or fall with the rising and falling of the Bible. Faith can stand on its own merits, and in my experience is not dependant on the merits (or the lack of merits) of the Bible. At the same time I respect the experiences of many of the writers on its pages, and I find common ground with them, I value them, and so simply disposing of the Bible has never seemed like a viable option to me, for this would be devaluing the lived experience of another human being. As well, the experiences of others have not been my experience, and for many people their connection to faith has become deeply bound to the Bible, so much so that any critique of the Bible is emotionally interpreted as a critique of faith itself. This deeply emotional response best explains the aptly name process of ‘Biblical apologetics'. If the Bible was truly harmonious, then this would be accepted as a simple fact and there would be no controversy, and no need for apologetics. It is the fact that the Bible is unharmonious that makes ‘harmonization' of the Bible so necessary (for no one would need to bother trying to ‘harmonize' a book in which harmony already existed. The process of harmonization itself testifies that the Bible is not a harmonious unity.)

      The Bible is a record of human experience and is a compilation of various human traditions, some of which are, unfortunately, downright immoral and abhorrent, cruel and vicious and hostile to humanity and everything that it means to be human. It is a common doctrine of religion that morality is timeless and unchanging, but the Bible recommends genocide, the raping of virgins, the killing of small infants, burning at the stake, indiscriminate revenge, racism, and it is not valid to declare such things immoral while then engaging in the practice of Biblical apologetics to excuse such wicked conduct if it should happen to be advocated on the pages of the Bible. The same ideology that the Bible recommends, it also condemns. The Bible is a compilation of opposing traditions and variant ideologies and a collection of human traditions. It reflects human struggles and is the product of human experiences.

      Consider the following simple examples. We know that the Jewish people were split into two nations for centuries, Israel in the north, Judah in the south. An examination of the Bible demonstrates that during this time of separation traditions developed in both countries, traditions that were then edited together in the final manuscript we now call the Bible when the Jewish nation was once again joined as one nation after the Babylonian exile. (This is an over simplified model, for within each nation were also found variant traditions, complicating the picture - this should be no surprise to anyone, for even today we have ‘liberal' Christians, ‘fundamentalist' Christians, ‘Reform' Judaism, ‘Conservative' Judaism, ‘Orthodox' Judaism, and the list goes on. The more things change, the more they stay the same.) It was this experience of separation and then reunion, and the development of isolated traditions which then became united during the editing process of the Bible that explains the contradictory nature of the Biblical manuscripts and the conflicting accounts of events and doctrine we find on its pages. These were human experiences and these experiences led to the development of human religious traditions. Some of these experiences touch on something universal in human nature, others are products of their time and culture. Some are meaningful to me and some I actually abhor (such as the linking of religion and politics in the dogma of ‘Holy War.')

      That this broad range of opinion and experience exists in the Bible is easily recognized by anyone who takes the time to investigate carefully, keeping an open mind. In the book of Genesis we are told that Joseph asked that his bones be taken away from Egypt and buried with those of his ancestors. According to Genesis, Abraham purchased the ancestral burial ground, and it was located near Mamre, in the south, which would correspond with the territory of Judah during the time of the divided Kingdoms, indicating a southern source for this particular tradition. According to the book of Joshua, the tomb of the patriarchs was located in Shechem, in the north, which coincidentally was the capital city of the northern kingdom of Israel during the time of separation. Joseph, requested that he be buried in the ancestral burial grounds, and that he not be buried in Egypt, and we are told, Joseph was buried in Shechem, in the north, not Mamre in the south, thus suggesting an origin for the burial tradition of Joseph that originated in the north, not the south.

      The Gospels in the Church Testament also preserve variant traditions and represent different ideological viewpoints. For example in Matthew's gospel, we read in his ‘Sermon on the Mount', "how blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. How blessed are you when you hunger and thirst after righteousness, for you will be satisfied." Luke presents us with a ‘Sermon on the Plain' and Matthews terminology is changed in significant ways. According to Luke, "How blessed are the poor, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. How blessed are those who are hungry and thirsty, for they will be filled." Luke then adds words not found in Matthew's version. "But how terrible for those of you who are rich, for you have had all you are ever going to get." The parable of poor Lazarus, who went to heaven, and the rich man who ignored his sufferings and went to hell, is peculiar to the gospel of Luke. As well, according to Luke, in the book of Acts, the early churches were practicing communists. They all pooled their resources into communal farms and no one had personal possessions, but rather everything belonged to everyone. The concept of private property was abolished. Luke's gospel was written from the perspective of a community of Christians on the radical ‘left wing' and this explains the minor changes and adaptions made to earlier stories in the gospel of Luke, and it also explains the presence of parables and traditions (from the economic left) found only in Luke and Acts and nowhere else. You can contrast the presentation of riches in Luke, also present to a lesser degree in the other gospels, with the book of Proverbs where we are assured that it is Lazarus who is sinful and that his persecutors and those who ignore his sufferings are righteous, for being holy and being rich are considered the same in the book of Proverbs.

      Another distinctive feature of Luke's gospel is the attempted ‘harmonization' of every variant and every conflicting tradition found on the pages of the Bible. There were two traditions concerning the place of pilgrimage to visit the ancestral burial place (for political reasons, one corresponding to Israel in the north, and another corresponding to Judah in the south.) According to Luke:

"And Jacob went down into Egypt. And he died, himself and our fathers, and they were carried back to Shechem and laid in the tomb that Abraham had bought for a sum of silver from the sons of Hamor in Shechem." (Acts 7:15)

      The Bible contains multiple traditions and preserves variant versions of historical fact. In the book of Acts the author attempts to deal with these inconsistent passages through a strange process of harmonization that I call ‘taking half a loaf'. In Genesis the tomb was in Mamre but it was Jacob who purchased the tomb from Hamor long after the time that Abraham died. The author of Acts took bits and pieces from Genesis and bits and pieces from the book of Joshua (the northern tradition) to spin together a very strange ‘harmonized' account that basically takes half a loaf from each conflicting tradition and glues them together to create a new loaf. This, I would suppose is one idea as to how one might deal with inconsistent and contradictory traditions, but it certainly isn't my approach.

      From this we can surmise that Luke put emphasis on unity, even among the disparate factions and traditions represented in the early churches and in Judaism, and this ‘half a loaf from here, half a loaf from there' approach was an attempt to reach a compromise that would bring unity among the disparate factions in the movement. It was done deliberately, and I can only assume that this convergence, this ‘half a loaf approach' was intended to serve some purpose. (This peculiar style of harmonization infuses the entire gospel of Luke and pervades the book of Acts. Thus we are certainly not reading ‘history' here, because true history never consists of deliberately taking a half a loaf from here or there, but is intent on finding literal truth.) This was the experience of the community that Luke represented, and these were their responses and their proposed solutions. They may not be mine, and it is here that I find myself struggling with the Bible as a rule of faith. In just what way do I encounter the traditions recorded on the pages of the Bible.

      Luke was a ‘communist' from the far left but it was one of the peculiarities of his character that he was also ‘a harmonizer' which I assume was his way of being ‘a peacemaker'. Luke put a premium on unity, even if to achieve unity one had to invent fictions and reach a compromise whereby everyone would be left with half a loaf. Mark, on the other hand, wrote the gospel of Joshua as a rebel against tradition and a religious radical who made no compromises. (Mark's gospel is my favorite.) Luke imposes his half a loaf methodology on the gospel of Mark, as well, as I will demonstrate, silencing Mark, nullifying Mark, all for the sake of enforced compromise, for the sake of Luke's own personal preference for a ‘middle of the road approach' to doctrine and religious practice (while at the same time, when it came to left wing politics, Luke showed no willingness to compromise, as is demonstrated by the story of the ‘purge of the Kulak' in the gospel of Acts - a Kulak, then as now, being someone who refused to join the collective farm. While I have heard it coming back at me again and again from the television pulpit that these two 'kulaks' were guilty of 'lying to the holy spirit', I will point two things out here. First, Luke employs a poison pen to blacken the name of anyone he opposes. This is a propaganda technique, and would be easily recognized as such were such tactics not employed on the pages of the Bible, but rather against living human beings today. Second, Luke was clearly advocating communism, and then, as now, there would always be those who didn't want to go along with it, who would then be blackened in polemic and become the targets of damning propaganda assaults. Luke's gospel is clearly not history, but rather a type of polemic. The only reason why the pulpits of the religious right try to deny that Luke and his community advocated communism is because it is the doctrine of the religious right that the Bible advocates only capitalism, and it is humiliating to them to note that it advocates communism. You see, they claim to 'obey God's word' which is of course 'infallible and inerrant in every respect' but they are less than enthused about practicing communism themselves, and with so many in the pulpit having become extremely wealthy, it goes without saying that the communism of Luke's community will have to be denied somehow, through some type of tricky argumentation.)

      On this site I have posted a comparison of the three synoptic gospels (this is a work in progress as I am writing this in September, 2000). Consult the comparison of Mark chapter 7. Here Mark launches into an attack on religious traditions and the food laws. Notice how this parable appears in Matthew but has been purged from Luke's gospel. Luke allowed no criticism of religious traditions, and this is also demonstrated in Luke's purging of the radical traditions of the early church and the prophets in his book of Acts. Luke allows Mark's critique of the Sabbath but eliminates Mark's criticism of Joshua's family, in particular his mother. When you consult the Synoptic comparison of Mark Chapter 6 you will see that both Mark and Matthew agree that Christ had brothers and sisters, but this entire passage is purged from Luke's gospel (here we see the beginnings of the dogma of the Perpetual Virgin first beginning to take shape). Luke allows no criticism of Mary, and also allows Christ no brothers and sisters. Similarly to much criticism of disciples is not allowed by Luke. (Compare Mark 10:35 to see that once again Luke purges this critical description of the disciples. As you can tell by reading the opening section of Mark 10 in the synoptic comparison, Luke also does not allow it to be suggested that the law of Moses could be critiqued.) And there are many other examples of similar things.

      Luke does not stop at nullifying Mark, altering Matthew. He tones down the earlier radical traditions of the church surrounding Joshua (while further radicalizing the church in economic ideology) and he also silences Paul and nullifies Paul. Paul, the radical, becomes a compliant traditionalist in Luke's gospel, in keeping with Luke's agenda of eliminating every trace of doctrinal radicalism in the early church, with the notable exception of radical communism. This would appear to be Luke's one ‘sacred cow' and while everyone had to give up their sacred cows, in Luke's version of the perfect church, Luke, as much as anyone else, had that ‘one sacred cow' that simply could not be compromised.

      While Luke was an economic radical, he was also politically extremely conservative, and promoted compliant submission to all forms of political authority (the doctrine of ‘the divine right of Kings' becoming an expression of this mode of thinking that developed as the church grew in power and influence, eventually becoming another form of political power itself). Throughout Luke's book of Acts the Roman authorities are portrayed as very favorable to the gospel, even eager to hear the gospel. It is not surprising then to find that Luke makes significant changes to the story of Herod which is found in Mark chapter 6 verse 14. In Luke's version the criticism of Herod is blunted, and in keeping with Luke's politically conservative presentation in Acts, Herod, like all the Roman rulers in Acts, is eager for the gospel, and actively ‘sought to meet Christ.' This novelty is unique to Luke. In Mark's gospel Herod and his men were actively plotting with the religious pharisees from the start to murder Joshua, something also not allowed by Luke - see chapter 3 verse 6 and compare- and not allowed by Matthew either, it turns out. In Matthew's version it was the pharisees who were the guilty parties, and in Luke's version it always ‘the mob.' In Luke's version of John the Baptist's sermon John condemns ‘the crowds' of common people, not the pharisees, and these are typical Lukan style politically conservative alterations. Luke was very insistent that people comply with every form of authority, whether religious or political.

      That Luke could be so economically radical, advocating what we would call radical communism and the communal farm, and yet remain so politically conservative seems remarkable, until you consider just how politically oppressive, even reactionary, modern communists were known to be ( which, along with Luke's dogma of ‘purging Kulaks,' shows that the more things change, the more they stay the same.)

      So where then does Luke fit into my own personal experience of faith? Shall I yield to Luke's demands and surrender my own personal beliefs for the communal welfare of all? Shall I become Luke, radically to the left economically, willing to harmonize inconsistent Bible accounts and giving my consent to whatever ‘official' version I am presented with, compliant to every form of religious and political authority, submissive and content to listen to Luke's purged version of Mark or Luke's watered down version of Paul? Personally, I prefer to read Mark's radicalism in Mark's own gospel and to read Paul in Paul's own words and don't see much of a point in surrendering objectivity in the service of Luke's communal doctrine of ‘harmonization.' I prefer to think for myself, and to keep on thinking, and where does this leave Luke, and where does this leave Luke's mythological communal unified church? (If I withdraw my consent, do I then become another one of Luke's ‘Kulaks'? Shall I be purged from the church? Shall I surrender my identity to the collective? Shall I became Luke? Shall Luke's thoughts become my thoughts?)

      I bring these matters to your attention just to demonstrate how problematic I find the Bible, and how much difficulty I have in finding a place for this book in my experience of faith. Another person's solutions may not be my solutions, but when they are then the Bible has a place. This suggests that in the end, a personal experience of faith is the determining factor, and the Bible is definitely secondary as everyone who approaches the book, without exception, determines how it will be used based on their own personal decisions. That is simply a fact, and all claims of ‘inerrant scripture' are merely an attempt to impose one of the Bible's many ideologies on others (while engaging in subterfuge and trying to pretend that the Bible only endorses a single ideological point of view. Diversity is regarded with hostility, and human beings thus must serve books, and this is the real goal of the doctrine of ‘inerrancy of scripture,' since no such inerrancy actually exists, which is easily demonstrated. This is a political statement, and a statement about the organization of human societies, and not a description of the Bible itself.)

      That this site is so heavily weighted towards Biblical analysis is a reflection of how seriously I take this issue of setting people free from the rigid slavery to anything and everything that might happen to be found on the pages of the Bible. It was for freedom that Joshua and Yahweh set people free. As the early (radical) tradition of the church taught, refuse to submit again to a yoke of slavery. It is truly ironic then that the pervasive expression of religion in the church as it developed throughout history seems to consist of compelling people to submit to a yoke of slavery expressed in the form of Luke style selective appropriation of scripture (selective because the Bible is so contradictory in terms of dogma and ideology that when something is chosen, something opposite and opposing must be rejected, a point I will demonstrate again and again and again. The dogma of ‘inerrant scripture', ‘sola scripture' (which means, ‘only scripture') are only employed to attempt to force compliance to this cobbled together loaf of selected quotes and chosen dogma. It is a deliberate attempt to deprive people of their freedom to think and evaluate. If the righteous will live by faith then it follows that they will fall by this type of faithless submission to the yoke of slavery imposed upon them by human authority and human tradition. Because this issue is so important to me, you will presently find this site heavily weighted towards exposing the truth about the conflicts in the Bible, and this is an expression of my firmly held belief that people should never, ever be enslaved. They should think. They must make decisions. They must take personal responsibility. Religion as a form of bondage and slavery to systems, ideologues and dogma is loathsome to me, and it is this type of thinking that runs beneath the surface of my Bible pages, and is the point I am trying to illustrate.)

     To paraphrase what Paul wrote in the book of Galatians, who is trying to stop you from acknowledging the truth? Remember that even a little bit of yeast raises the whole lump of dough and even convincing you to accept a little bit of falsehood is enough to begin the process of corrupting your reason and destroying your faith. So whoever it is who keeps trying to deceive you about the Bible must bear God's judgment. As for me, my friends, if I am preaching the 'infallible inerrancy' of the scriptures, then why I am being persecuted. To do that would be to remove the offense of the cross. As for those opponents of mine, I wish they would just go all the well and remove their entire brain. But as for you, you are being called to freedom!