364 Quotes About Scripture

No knowledge comes from the outside world or an imaginary supernatural paradise.

All of us, some frequently, feel undervalued and unseen. Yet, our deepest pains are lessened in that moment of recognition that Jesus...gets it. That his own feet have walked through this very pain. May we stretch to be like him, and live for his accolade alone, his face only before us. For soon, as Scripture promises, we will be face to face." from "The Bare Branch" p.43

Despite two millennia of Christian apologetics, the fact is that belief in a dying and rising messiah simply did not exist in Judaism. In the entirety of the Hebrew Bible there is not a single passage of scripture or prophecy about the promised messiah that even hints of his ignominious death, let alone his bodily resurrection.

Thus it is written that the messiah would suffer and rise again on the third day," Jesus instructs his disciples (Luke 24:44–46). Except that nowhere is any such thing written: not in the Law of Moses, not in the prophets, not in the Psalms. In the entire history of Jewish thought there is not a single line of scripture that says the messiah is to suffer, die, and rise again on the third day, which may explain why Jesus does not bother to cite any scripture to back up his incredible claim.

The law was good, Paul wrote, and its purpose vital. But its purpose was also temporary. Once Christ fulfilled the law, his followers would have trivialized his sacrifice by living as though they were still subject to the law's constraints.

Any book that claims to be a book of life and love while demanding absolute obedience is but a book of death and degradation.

By-passing all scriptures and all that any teacher has to say, we shall, while respecting every finger that points to the moon, be mindful only of the moon. This habit will make it easier to understand the truth that every statement is wrong, whenever made by any man, for it was made in duality and is therefore one-sided, incomplete, and in the final synthesis its opposite is just as true!

The point is, if you pay attention to the women, a more complex history of Israel's conquests emerges. Their stories invite the reader to consider the human cost of violence and patriarchy, and in that sense prove instructive to all who wish to work for a better world.

Women in the scriptures were not systematically ignored any more than the majority of men were; they simply wielded their influence in a more intimate, less visible sphere.