Bible Curious: Recent Episodes
Arthur Milliken
Bible Curious is an exploration into sacred scripture, driven by curiosity. The population of planet Earth is 33% Christian. It's 24% Muslim, and the Qur'an does acknowledge the Bible as Holy Scripture. Between these two faiths, that's over half of Earth's population. If I was an alien coming to this planet for the first time, and I wanted to play a game of "Take Me To Your Leader," it wouldn't take long before I found this book in my hands. If I want to understand this planet, planet Earth, I need to know what's in this text. To ignore it, or to dismiss it casually, is to cast aside the very underpinnings of western civilization, which is the dominant culture of this planet. I mean, aren't you at least curious about what it actually says? I know I am.
In Genesis chapter 15, God makes a covenant with Abraham, even going so far as "signing the dotted line" in ancient terms. In this episode, we examine the terms and context of this contract, including reading some of the fine print concealed behind numeric gematria encodings.
The fourteenth chapter of Genesis gives a historical account of a conflict known as the War of the Nine Kings, in which four kings from Mesopotamia to the east march into the promised land with their armies to punish the Canaanites for not paying their taxes. Abraham's nephew Lot is taken captive during this exchange, prompting Abraham to muster soldiers of his own to rescue his wayward nephew. Afterwards, Abraham is greeted by Melchizidek, a mysterious priest who commemorates Abraham's victory with a feast of bread and wine.
As Abram and Lot's fortunes grow, they find themselves in competition over the best grazing land. To ease this tension, Abram makes the surprising decision to surrender the best available land over to his nephew, while keeping the remainder for himself. In doing so, Abram begins to exercise his new-found faith. What exactly does it mean to be the recipient of God's promise? And how far into the future does the fulfillment of such a promise extend?
Yahweh's calling of Abraham is a pivotal moment in the narrative of Genesis. Modern people know Abraham best for the harrowing account where God asks him to sacrifice his own son Isaac as a burnt offering, and Abraham actually obeys, only to be stopped by an angel at the last moment and told to sacrifice a wild ram instead.
This astonishing act of total submission to God's will is held up by Christians, Jews and Muslims alike as a model of perfect faith and obedience, while at the same time being used by critics as evidence that the God of the Bible is a sadistic tyrant. What exactly is this "faith" so often spoken about in reference to God and the Bible?
In this episode, Nathan, Dong and I finish the conversation we started previously. We talk about the moral implications of being human. Are we indeed beings of free will, or are we simply biological machines, acting upon impulses buried too deep in our subconscious for us to ever fully understand? What about Church? Does organized religion help us to achieve our moral obligation? Who are you, really? Who am I? Is it possible to make real contact with a personal God, or is all of this just delusional wishful thinking?
Before diving back into Genesis and the story of Abraham the Patriarch, I want to share a recent conversation I had with a Christian Chinese American named Dong, introduced to me by my good friend Nathan Johnson, whom I have known since my college years at UCLA. Dong grew up with an as an athiest in communist China but found in the Christian lifestyle a practical way to bring harmony to his family, regardless of his personal beliefs.
In the following conversation, Dong shares his experience transitioning from atheism to Christianity, a journey also driven by curiosity and a search for truth. The three of us also take some time to reflect upon the first season of Bible Curious, and to take a look at some of its unanswered questions.
The Tower of Babel is one of those strange legends which sounds utterly preposterous on the face of it, but serves as a neat explanation for a real, observable phenomenon: in this case, the proliferation of languages and cultures found across the Middle-East. This legend also casts God in the role of a spoiler, who just can't seem to leave us humans alone to make our own way on this planet.
The genealogy chart given in the tenth chapter of Genesis, popularly known as "The Table of Nations," is important because it is the first chapter which firmly places the Bible on a historical footing, since many of the names contained within it can be directly correlated with ancient cities and tribes known to historians today.
After the Great Flood, the eight surviving descendents of Adam and Eve along with God had the challenge of setting new terms for the human civilizations which would subsequently bloom from this family. These terms would take the form of a covenant, or contract, between God and the survivors of the flood.
The Great Flood was a catastrophic storm engineered to wipe out all life on earth, and if you take the Bible at its word, was large enough to cover even the highest mountains of the land. This narrative, like the account of the six days of creation, is often used by skeptics as evidence that the Bible could not possibly be historical or factual.
The famous tale of Noah, who built an ark to save humanity from a world-wide flood, is one of the best-known stories in the Old Testament. While geological and archeological evidence has categorically disproven that the earth was ever completely submerged by a single body of water within the last ten thousand years, it is not unreasonable to believe that a flood may have occurred which was large enough to convince a single family of eight people that everyone in the world had perished.
Today we will examine a genealogy table known as the Generations of Adam, which the Book of Genesis places immedately after the genealogical history of Cain.
Now that Mankind has been expelled from Paradise, we witness the original sin of disobedience evolve into a much more serious crime: murder.
One of the most controversial doctrines coming out of the Biblical tradition is the notion of "original sin." This is the idea that mankind in its natural, unmodified state is somehow deficient, and requires the guidance of a superior intelligence in order to achieve redemption.
Studying the Holy Bible is not easy. As soon as you turn the first page, you will be slapped in the face with contradictions. When Moses wrote the Book of Genesis in 1,500 BC, he was describing events which took place as many as twenty-five centuries before he was even born. Where did these stories come from? What sources did Moses rely upon when he wrote these stories down? And why is it so confusing and self-contradictory?
Today we pick up after the end of the second day, which found God or Elohim lost at sea in the midst of a raging storm. After rescuing himself from drowning by finding light and therefore breath above the surface of the water, Elohim began to define his universe by separating that which is above from that which is below, and recognizing the sky or Heaven as the source of breath and therefore life.
In the Book of Genesis, Moses makes the outrageous claim that God created the heavens and the earth in six days. OK, I'll bite. IF there is such a thing as God, and IF God did in fact create Heaven and Earth, why in the world would anyone claim that it took only six days to do? And why on earth would he take the additional step of DATING the creation to 4000 B.C.? Why would anyone paint himself into a corner like that? Aren't you just a little bit #BibleCurious?
In this third and final passage from the Sermon on the Mount which represents the conclusion of this initiatory discourse, Jesus introduces some of the sacred mysteries, using parables, riddles and "dark sayings" containing multilayered meanings to put his disciples on the correct path toward enlightenment.
In this next segment of the Sermon on the Mount, taken from the Gospel According to Matthew, Jesus gives commandments for worship. By following these simple instructions, anyone can establish and maintain a working relationship with the Father. As you listen to the following passage, notice the utter simplicity of Jesus' doctrine.
Today I want to begin discussion of the Sermon on the Mount, from the Gospel According to Matthew. This sermon is the central thesis of Jesus' teaching, and it was reading this sermon over twenty years ago which marked the beginning of my relationship with this great teacher.
This is the third and final segment of my conversation with Tom F. We talk about the Bible from a personal angle, using it as a roadmap for personal redemption. If I'm not a Christian, are these teachings for me? We talk about belief and unbelief; damnation and salvation; sin and human nature; sexual taboo; mystery; and, how do we bring the teachings of the Bible up to date with modern times?
This is the second part of my conversation with Tom F. In this segment we talk theology. We discuss the six days of creation, what is God's agenda regarding humanity, Heaven and Earth, Judgement, Hell and the afterlife.
This is part one of an interview with my friend Tom F, who wanted to have a conversation with me about why I decided to take on this project. In this segment, we cover a number of topics, including my own motivations for doing this project, how can a person with a rational, scientific mindset take the Bible seriously, where did these stories come from, and who is God? So without any further preamble, let's dive right in.
Let's start with Exodus Chapter 20, known popularly as The Ten Commandments. This part of the story takes place about 1,500 BC. God's chosen people, the Israelites, found themselves camped in the Sinai Desert after being liberated from four generations of slavery to the Egyptian pharoahs. Once liberated, this tribal people proved to be rebellious, contentious and generally misbehaved. Moses found himself spending most of his time settling disputes between rival families. And so Yahweh calls everyone before Mount Sinai to "lay down the Law" (the Torah) in specific terms.