Gloucestershire Group Meeting – How to read the Bible and still be a Christian
Saturday 7 March 2020
Based on his book of this title, Dominic Crossan has recorded a series of lectures looking at divine violence as found in the Bible from Genesis to Revelation. He thinks we should rise above this greatest of Christian treasons: that everlasting peace requires the onslaught of divine inspired violence. All welcome- Start Date:
- Saturday 7th March 2020
- Start Time:
- 2:30PM
- Location:
- Christchurch, Abbeydale, Gloucester
- Contact:
- Andy Vivian
- Phone:
- 01594 516528
- Email:
- andy.vivian@pcnbritain.org.uk
- Speakers:
- Dominic Crossan (on video)
- Cost:
- £2 weekly sub towards expenses such as refreshments and hire of the room
Crossan argues that to try to understand the Bible without understanding the culture and place out of which it arose it folly. It would be like trying to understand Ghandi without learning about British imperialism. And yet when it comes to the Bible churches usually imagine that simply translating the text into English will be enough.
In this first video episode Crossan puts the Genesis stories of Adam and Eve and Cain and Abel into their literary context, which is the much older legend of Gilgamesh. This is a Sumerian myth which would have been common knowledge throughout the civilised world. Far from being stories of sin and punishment, Crossan claims the stories in Genesis are stories about human mortality and, importantly, they contain a warning about the dangerously escalating nature of violence.
The lecture part will be about 25 minutes followed by discussion.