If then it is possible that the Early Church could have changed, rejected, selected, and adapted some material, how can every word of the gospels, or even the whole bible, be literally true. However it is not just the Early Church that could have changed their material. Redaction Critics take it one step further, and look at the synoptic writers not just as mere "collectors" or " editors" but also as "creative gospel writers, using material for their own purposes. It seems likely that as the gospel writers concentrated on particular themes they did this for a purpose. Redaction critics concentrate on almost exclusively the way that the gospel writers have used material to express a particular theology. These two theories put forward by form and redaction critics seem to suggest that maybe the bible isn't true at all. Perhaps it is just twisted versions of the truth to suit the sitz im Leben of the early church and also the particular redactions of the gospel writers themselves.
Other traditional views such as Life after death have also been questioned recently. Traditionally Heaven and Hell were real and if you were a Christian you went to heaven, if not you went to hell. However when people started to question the existence of God, it then in turn questioned the belief in life after death too. Eternal life with the Lord was it true or was it myth? I guess we will never know.
There is also the problem of suffering in the world. Tradition told us that the reason for suffering was because you had done something wrong in God’s eyes, you had been wrong and the devil had succeeded. However we now know that suffering happens to all people no matter whether you are a Christian or not. The problem arises when we look at the description of God created by Christians and Philosophers, that God is all-powerful and all loving. If God loved us why would he let us suffer, and if God were all-powerful he would be able to, so why does Evil and Suffering still exist?
Traditional Christianity has sought to solve the problem by putting forward the Augustinian and Irenian Theodicies. Augustine believed we had a perfect world but it all went wrong through the free will and reasoning of Mankind. So it is not God’s fault but ours. Irenian believed that instead of being created into a perfect world as perfect beings we were created with faults so that we can develop into the perfect beings God intended us to be and that is the reason for suffering and Evil in the world we live in today.
This I feel is what was meant by the first part of the quote above that says:
"Previous Generations thought they knew what was true..."
What was considered by previous generations to be true, we know today that maybe they weren't always right. Even today we are still learning of new theories and beliefs that have been
Sought.
The next part of the quote:
" and what was right..."
Seems to suggest to me the morality of previous generations. The issues of abortion or marriage perhaps. When people were married it was a commitment not to be taken lightly, and the authorities at the time made sure everyone was clear on that fact. Marriage was a bind, a bond to another person that really meant something back then. The vows were to be taken very seriously..."till death do us part". God made woman for man in the beginning and if you chose not to marry you were considered to be abusing that gift from God. Abortion was wrong, Life was sacred, a gift and one that should not be destroyed. If a young man made a young woman pregnant, he was expected to face his responsibilities like a man and marry the girl, for it was very wrong in those times to be with child and not be married. I wouldn't necessarily say that these views were wrong but perhaps people were scared of what the consequences would be if they didn’t follow society or more importantly follow the teachings and sayings of Jesus as it says in the Bible. For example Deuteronomy chapter 22 verse 13-30 talks about the way things should be in marriage and divorce and sex before marriage was considered wrong by the lord, and so that is why people from earlier generations believed in these morals.
I am not saying that they were definitely wrong in thinking these things all I am saying is that these views are considered in today’s society to be old fashioned. Teenagers regularly get married or have abortions and nobody even blinks an eye. I feel this is because Authorities have lost their power over us and now that we have realised we have the ability to think for ourselves, and reason things out, we can decide for ourselves without relying on Christian Authorities to tell us what to do.
Therefore in conclusion I agree with the above statement that nothing is certain any more, however I also feel that the views older generations had are not old fashioned but traditional. Tradition is comforting to people and I don’t feel that there is any shame in wanting the traditional things in life. Finally I feel that there is one old Authority that will never lose authority over us and that is God. He will have Authority over us all forever.
b). Up until the 20th Century, people were considered blasphemous Heretics if they worshipped Gods other than the Christian God and if they did not believe that the bible was the word of God and it was the literal truth. People were tortured, persecuted or burnt at the stake because of their ability to think for themselves. Religion was pushed upon these people, it was a way of life, and no one dared to question it.
Christians follow many beliefs in their lives through their faith in God. What used to be the majority in faith has now become the minority, because people became more inquisitive and started to ask more and more questions, until eventually the authorities of the church couldn’t keep up. They lost their power over peoples ability to reason and therefore we reached the world we have today, one full of conflict between faith and faithless, believers and non-believers.
Science has played a huge part in the arguments about God that we have today. One particular argument that Science has greatly contributed to is the Theory of the Creation. Christians believe that God created the universe and everything in it in 7 days.
Scientists have put many theories forward. For example, “The Big Bang Theory”. Scientists believe that 15 billion years ago the world was a dense matter that suddenly exploded in the space of 100th of a millisecond. Thus the world and everything in it was created. The theistic implications seemed so clear and exciting that even Pope Pius XII was led to comment, “True science to an ever increasing degree discovers God as though God were waiting behind every door opened by science.
This Theory provides a scientific explanation for the beginning of the universe. Those scientists who accept the Big Bang theory regard it as the moment at which time began. People use the Big Bang theory to prove or deny the existence of God. The question is though was the Big Bang created by a random event or a deliberate divine action of God.
The Big Bang however has not been proved, but on the other hand neither has the existence of God so until the existence of God is proved scientists will continue to put forward more theories to prove that the theology of a world being created by a divine creator is false.
Another theory, which has been put forward by scientists, is Evolution. Evolution, an idea put forward by Charles Darwin, which he explains in his work on the origin of species by natural selection. The book challenged the argument for design, as it revolutionised the way in which species, including human beings, developed. Darwin provided an alternative explanation for the development of life on earth, without reference to creation by God. “The survival of the fittest” is how we know it today, a term put forward by Herbert Spencer.
There are many theories that people, not just scientists, have tried to put forward and prove, to prove that the world was not created by divine power but by natural causes or science. The primeval soup idea for example. The idea that we evolved from molecules that developed into human beings and all life on the planet. Scientists have put forward one other argument. This is called the “Steady State Theory”. This theory provides a scientific explanation that would undermine the cosmological argument as it denies a beginning to the universe. This theory suggests that there wasn’t one almighty bang and then that was it, but instead it suggests that there was a series of tiny bangs or pops and that even today the world is continuing to develop.
The Design Argument then fights back by suggesting that the world was not created by the Big Bang or Evolution and the survival of the fittest, just because of the evidence that we see around us. The world that we live in today has great beauty and almost design and so theists believe that an explosion or anything else, other than a divine creator, couldn’t have possibly created such a beautiful world. David Hume, in his dialogues concerning Natural religion 1779, said that if the human experience of design were valid, the design argument would prove that the universe has a designer.
All these views although they haven’t been around very long, seem to suggest that the existence of a divine creator is tunnel vision and old fashioned. These modern views have challenged theology to its limit but I feel that no matter what new theories and views are thought of, there will always be room for beliefs in the existence of God because some people believe that God isn’t meant to be explained or proved, for if it was what would we have to look forward to. The existence of heaven and hell would be proved and no one would have the mysterious quality in their lives anymore. Some things just aren’t meant to be explained or proved.
