What is the New Testament???

[CarSuperfreak]

and the rest of the NT is the aposteles teachings the the other churches that they founded:
@Phillipi (phillipians)
to the Ephesians, Corinthians, etc
letter to James....etc

[Raz_Kaz]

So pretty much, depending on your belief, the letters could have been man made or a direct writing of the Holy Spirit. Interesting...thanks for all the info guys

[CarSuperfreak]

yea; some people believe that none of the NT is inspired, some believe some of it is, and others (like myself) believe that every word is the Inspired Word of God

[FireBball972]

Originally Posted by freakray

Pick is quite correct.
Most of the New Testament is letters written by the apostles to different churches of the time.
If you read them names of the books correctly, they are 'letter to the Galatians' and so forth.
The first 4 books of the New Testament document the life of Jesus, the second 2 are the acts of the apostles after the crucifiction and the majority of the rest are compiled letters.

[Raz_Kaz]

Thanks CarSuperfreak and all who posted (special thanks to pick for not being jack ass to me as I was to him),
I was always told the version of how these prests wrote the letters themselves and had their own interpretation of Jesus' life. I learnt something new today

[CarSuperfreak]

yes i was going to say; props to all who posted. very civil exchange of ideas and info was much appreciated.

[2strokebloke]

My opinion is that the New Testament, could be called an "opinion piece" These books were written by people who believed in God and wrote down their beliefs. So I never look at them as though God wrote or dictated them, but rather as what people thought and believed about God at that time.
I believe this to be correct, because of what was ommited from the New Testament. That there was originally going to be a text about the origins of man and sin (Genesis type stuff) which differed somewhat from the book of Genesis, show that yes opinions were involved in writing either this new text or the old text (or both, more likely).

[DGB454]

The books of the New Testament were written by people who have either had personal contact with Christ or had contact with God. Not simply people who believed in God.


Learn a little about what you are giving opinions on before giving an opinion. You will be less likely to give a misleading opinion then.

[DGB454]

Originally Posted by Raz_Kaz

So pretty much, depending on your belief, the letters could have been man made or a direct writing of the Holy Spirit. Interesting...thanks for all the info guys

Sure. Just like the Qur'an. It's a matter of your beliefs and faith.

[2strokebloke]

Anybody can claim to be in contact with God, that they really are - only God would know!
I don't find my opinion any less missleading than your opinion on these people's opinions.
Also, if God was in fact dictating to them the Bible, then why would there be variations of the same story? God is supposed to be perfect, he doesn't make mistakes, so either the people who wrote these things down made the mistakes - OR - they were letting thier own bias into the text.

[DGB454]

Dictating? Did I say dictating?

[2strokebloke]

Essentially you are. If it was the word of God, written through them, then it would be him dictating, like somebody would do with a secretary.
Their words, somebody else writing them.
Or I missunderstood you, and you meant that while these people were in contact with God, they did not however write down what he was telling them word for word - basically that is they wrote in their own words, not God's which is what I wrote previously.

[DGB454]

Originally Posted by 2strokebloke

Essentially you are. If it was the word of God, written through them, then it would be him dictating, like somebody would do with a secretary.
Their words, somebody else writing them.
Or I missunderstood you, and you meant that while these people were in contact with God, they did not however write down what he was telling them word for word - basically that is they wrote in their own words, not God's which is what I wrote previously.

Correct. God did not dictate. This however doesn't mean that there is room for all of their own interpretation.Some interpretations could be false or misleading. God lead them what to write. He would not allow false statements in his word to be believed as truths.

What you said earlier was that these were all just people who believed and wrote down what they believed. Even ruling out those who had personal contact with God(because you believe they could be liars) that still leaves those who were the deciples of Christ. Were they also making up that they were his deciples?

[2strokebloke]

Well, even Christ is presented in different ways in some of the texts that were left out. When the New Testament was created, the churches who were putting it together, wanted only one version of who Jesus was, and what his purpose on Earth was.
Other stories, those that aren't in the bible, suggested that Jesus was not the son of God sent to Earth to forgive us of our sins, but rather simply a man, in touch with God destined to teach others about God and how they should live.
The biggest reason the New Testament was created, was to make one view of things, since before hand there were two many variations - most were only slight, but lead to many different beliefs from what were at their core the same stories.
So taking into account the variations, and the fact that it was the church that made the final decisions as to what went in and what stayed out, I maintain that the New Testament is still a selective piece, with opinions represented by it.
You may say that God would never let anybody make stuff up for him, but he gave us free will - and allows us to do what we want. I wonder what God would have to say about the usage of "his word" by the Lord's Resistance Army in Africa?
The old testament also has alot of stuff left out of it.

[RedLightning]

[quote=2strokebloke]Other stories, those that aren't in the bible, suggested that Jesus was not the son of God sent to Earth to forgive us of our sins, but rather simply a man, in touch with God destined to teach others about God and how they should live.
QUOTE]

well they are prolly not in there b/c that goes againts the rest of the Bible. Just wondering, who wrote those? There was a show on the History Channel about books left out, any of u see it? I did not see most of it(i only saw like 15min). But ya, why would you put in contradicting things? Pluss that sounds like the Koran(however you spell it). is that african army thing one of those anti-muslim military groups? or one of those help organizations with the funny names? just wondering.