The bible says only 144.000 of us go to heaven.Where does the rest of us go? George

To a better heaven... LOL! ;)

PUL,
Cosmic_Ambitions

You know george, 12 X 12 = 144 . It's a symbolic number, but don't ask me what exactly it means, there must be tons of books about that. I wouldn't worry. Cosmic_Ambitions has given a cool answer, it's the right way to take those things, because we will not figure it out anyway.

Spooky

I hope they have a KFC in better heaven. ;D

wrote on May 2^nd, 2006 at 3:10pm:

The bible says only 144.000 of us go to heaven.Where does the rest of us go? George

The bible is referring to the VIP souls lounge ;)

This is why the bible is such rubbish as it was indeed written by men wishing to dominate other men by making statements like that

wrote on May 2^nd, 2006 at 9:53pm:

I hope they have a KFC in better heaven. ;D

I actually worry about getting stuck in a food heaven.  Something like a free mall food court that has a KFC and a cinnabon.  Really!

wrote on May 2^nd, 2006 at 3:10pm:

The bible says only 144.000 of us go to heaven.Where does the rest of us go? George

Boxmart  8)

wrote on May 2^nd, 2006 at 10:50pm:

I actually worry about getting stuck in a food heaven.  Something like a free mall food court that has a KFC and a cinnabon.  Really!

I dont think we have 'cinnabons' here in England but you mentioned "free" and "food" and im there  ;D

Trying to get this thread back on track.......................I've always wondered about this too George. I'm sure Berserk could answer this if he's still hanging around. And I would like to hear what he has to say about this.

Love, Mairlyn ;-)

I don't feel that the bible has all the awnsers, and if it did why would scholars choose to leave things out, or change its wording.

Good point dwdream2... ;)

PUL,
Cosmic_Ambitions

In ancient Jewish and Christian apocalyptic literature, numbers like 144,000 and 666 tend to be symbolic. In John's vision of the 144,000, the symbolic number is identified as the sum of the 12 tribes of Israel multiplied by 12,000 (Revelation 7:4-8).  The number 144,000 is calculated thus: 12 tribes of Israel x the 12 apostles x 1,000, the number symbolizing completion.  The symbolic number 144,000 assumes the identity of the church as the New Israel in a symbolic spiritual sense.  Paul also views the church as the New Israel in this spiritual sense (Galatians 6:16).  

Just how many people does John see in Heaven?  His answer is found in his next vision:

"After this, I looked and there before me was a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, tribe, people, and language (7:9)."

The number is large beyond imagining.  And how many can John imagine?  200 million soldiers, for example (9:16).  

Let' s put this unimaginable number in perspective.
In John's day, there are only a few thousand Christians. They attend small house churches because there are no large churches as archtecturally distinct structures in the first century.  John is languishing in exile on the isle of Patmos and members of his churches are being killed for their refusal to participate in the emperor cult.  Nero has recently decimated the church at Rome.  He executed them as scapegoats for his decision to burn much of Rome.  

John's vision seems to anticipate the ultimate salvation of righteous non-Christians.  The unimaginable numbers in Heaven seem to anticipate centuries of future earthly history.  This seems to refute the common belief at the time that Jesus' second coming was imminent.  I have elsewhere demonstrated the teaching in Revelation that God never permanently abandons anyone after death.  

Don

 

Thank you Don.

Love, Mairlyn

I'm sure that for some people who believe the bible literally, there will be exactly 143,999 other people in their heaven.     ;)

Don:

Do you believe that there are a lot of parts of the Bible that should be considered symbolically, rather than literally?

recoverer,

I would say "no" but let me illustrate a way in which I think you raise a valid issue.  The Genesis story of the 7 days of creation (1:1-2:4) is a piece of poetry designed for liturgical worship in the Jerusalem Temple.  The Hebrew word for "day" can mean "an age".  The sun is not created until the 4th "day."  That in itself rules out the notion of 24-hour days of creation.   Each of the first 6 days concludes with the liturgical phrase, "Even came, morning followed--the first (second, etc.) day."  But this phrase is omitted from the 7th day, the Sabbath rest.   This implies that we are still in the 7th day of creation.  So Genesis makes the valid point that creation proceeds in stages, but not necessarily exactly 7 stages.   The number 7 is used here to justify the Jewish practice of Sabbath rest on the 7th day.  

Also, consider this.  In the ancient Near East, it was widely believed that the stars are affixed to a dome which separates the waters above from the waters below.   So they imagine "waters" to fill what we know to be outer space.  God does not interfere with their scientific naivite.  But notice how Genesis reads if we read "outer space" where the Bible places waters.  "And the wind of God moved over the waters (= outer space).  Then God said, `Let there be light (Genesis 1:2-3).'"  Wind in outers pace implies an explosion resulting in light--a poetic image of the Big Bang.   Notice also that God does not simply speak vegation and animal life into being.  Instead, we are told, "Then God said, Let the earth bring forth (1:11, 24)" vegetation and animal life.  This image assumes the Near Eastern image of the Earth Mother, the ancient equivalent of Mother Nature.  Thus, in a sense, God steps aside and let's Mother Nature evolve life.  Also, notice that. like modern evolutionary theory, Genesis teaches that life begins in the sea and proceeds through birds, mammals, and finally humans. The creation of humanity in God's image (1: 26-27) is a poetic way of saying that "we are destined to "participate in the divine nature (2 Peter 1:4) and in that sense we can be considered sparks of divinity.  

In Proverbs 8:30, Wisdom (an equivalent of Mother Nature) speaks poetically about its role in creation:

"I was beside the master craftsman, delighting Him day after day, ever at play in His presence, at play everywhere on His earth."

The word "play" here implies a pointlessness or randomness that can be understood as functionally equivalent to the evolutionary principle of random selection.  In a poetic prophetic text, God reveals to Isaiah that the earth is a "circle" (Isaiah 40:22).  Profound scientific insights can be detected in biblical creation theology as long as we take it poetically rather than literally.  The story of Adam and Eve (2:4b- 3:24) is a totally separate creation myth designed to teach the essence of good and evil but absurd if taken as literal history.    

Moses leads the Israelites across the divided sea of reeds, a lake near their place of captivity, not the Red Sea.  The Hebrew literally means 'sea of reeds" and there are countless reeds by the lake in question, but none by the Red Sea.  This lake divides about once a century through a combination of wind and tide.  The miracle is the synchronicity of this rare event happening just when the fleeing Israelites need it to escape the Egyptian army.   Thereafter, "sea" (including the Sea of Galilee in the Gospels) becomes a symbol of the forces of chaos in our lives.  The Israelites are forced to survive decades in the Sinai wilderness.  Wllderness later becomes a biblical symbol for the dry periods of our spiritual quest or for what Catholic mystics call "the dark night of the soul."  

The Gospels document real miracles performed by Jesus, but not to provide historically accurate information about the "stunts" Jesus performed.   Rather, details of Jesus' miracles are preserved that  allow these true stories to function like parables.  For example, when Jesus' heals the  blind, the story is shaped to make a point about spiritual blindness.  

Don

It would be nice for humanity's sake if we had one clear, precise, indesputable fact sheet that covered all of the elements/aspects of both the spirit world and the physical world (*Casual Insert*... Let's thank Bruce and all of the others like him who have afforded openly/indiscriminately a "clearer" picture of this most complex, yet oh so simple, whole/reality that we unwittingly find ourselves in.) It just seems to me like what we have to work with on planet Earth regarding religious doctrine is a ball of muddy encrypted code left to be deciphered by anyone educated enough/intuitive enough/lucky enough to make logical iterations of the "muddiness" that most wallow in daily... When people are willing to die for texts/doctrines that are beyond encryptically muddy... it saddens me deeply. Just finding out that there were many "world changing" gospels that were purposefully left out/pulled out of the bible has left me weary, tired, and utterly exhausted...

Maybe if I flip this old, musty, muddy picture around a bit more I can see something that was unnoticeable to me in its previous state... How about the truth of the matter is... we need this textual muddiness/encrypted "poetic-ness" as a way to force us to look within ourselves with an always developing spiritual eye... In this way we are willingly forced to find the divine spark within each of us... Otherwise, I'm left to fend with the oxen.

PUL,
Cosmic_Ambitions

P.S. By the way that's how I stumbled across this site in the first place... Searching for the light amongst the clouds. (Confusion is the way to enlightenment.) Now let's get this ball rolling...

Don:

Thank you for the answer.

Most of the Bible has to be symbolic and not literal. If literal then one must accept that every word in the Bible is true. If so, how are contradictions like this possible?

II Kings tells us that Jehoiachin became king when he was eighteen while II Chronicles alleged that he became King at age eight:

II Kings 24:8
Jehoiachin was eighteen years old when he became King and he reigned three months in Jerusalem  

II Chronicles 36:9
Jehoiachin was eight years old when he began to reign, and he reigned three months and ten days in Jerusalem.  

or

II Samuel 24:9
And Joab gave the sum of the numbering of the people of the King: in Israel there were eight hundred thousand valiant men who drew the sword, and the men of Judah were five hundred thousand.  

I Chronicles 21:5
And Joab gave the sum of the numbering of the people to David. In all Israel there were one million one hundred men who drew the sword, and in Judah four hundred and seventy thousand who drew the sword.  

These are just a couple examples.

[jbb:] "Most of the Bible has to be symbolic and not literal. If literal then one must accept that every word in the Bible is true. If so, how are contradictions like this possible?"

(1) II Kings tells us that Jehoiachin became king when he was eighteen while II Chronicles alleged that he became King at age eight.
__________________________

Wrong!   Your googled false claim is based on inferior manuscript attestation.  The best critical texts of the Old Testament agree that 2 Chronicles agrees with 2 Kings 24:8 that "Jehoiachin was 18 [not 8] years old when he became king."  This insight is recognized by the best modern translations (e.g. the New International Version, the New Living Translation. and the New Jerusalem Bible).  This reading is supported by an important ancient Hebrew manuscript as well as ancient Syriac and Greek manuscripts.  

(2) "And Joab gave the sum of the numbering of the people of the King: in Israel there were 800,000 VALIANT men who drew the sword, and the men of Judah were 500.000 (1 Samuel 24:9)."

Versus

"And Joab gave the sum of the numbering of the people to David. In all Israel there were 1,100,000 men who drew the sword, and in Judah 470.000 who drew the sword (I Chronicles 21:5)."
__________________________________

Wrong again!  Your googled source  overlooks the significance of "valiant" in 1 Samuel 24:9.  There were 1,100,000 Israelite swordsmen, 800,000 of whom were "valiant" in the sense of veteran or battle-hardened swordsmen with 300,000 more inexperienced reserves.  Similarly, there were 500,000 veteran swordsmen from Judah and 30,000 reserves.  No contradiction!

Over the years, New Agers have posted several alleged Bible contradictions on this site that are in fact harmonious.  The errors usually arise from a ghetto mentality that googles incompetent online sources without consulting expert scholars.   That is not to say there are no errors in the Bible.   The Bible can be understood literally and still contain the errors typical of human documentation.  The Bible never claims to be inerrant.

Don

Quote:

Over the years, New Agers have posted several alleged Bible contradictions on this site that are in fact harmonious.  The errors usually arise from a ghetto mentality that googles incompetent online sources without consulting expert scholars.   That is not to say there are no errors in the Bible.   The Bible can be understood literally and still contain the errors typical of human documentation.  The Bible never claims to be inerrant.

You know Berserk/Don, you're obviously a smart guy who knows his history. You could have simply stated the correct versions of the examples and why and have pointed out that there are still errors in the Bible in a calm, rational argumentative style.

Instead you *chose* to take a condescending attitude and tone over details where, in the general you agree with errors in the Bible. And to assume the average or even 99% of the people who visit discussion boards on websites would have access to "expert scholars" is ludicrous at best.

Not exactly a good or friendly method for persuasion during a friendly discussion.

Both of your initial statements (quoted below) are irrationally and prematurely dogmatic:  

"Most of the Bible HAS TO BE symbolic and not literal. If literal then one MUST accept that every word in the Bible is true."

In my view, one of the biggest problems with the spiritual quest of many New Agers is their failure to rigorously distinguish what they know from what they don't know.   Inattention to this crucial line prevents them from being open to the best spiritual insights from both tradtional and nontraditional sources.  As a result, they get prematurely stuck in ghetto-based belief systems.  My response ot you would have been excruciatingly polite if you had not been so dogmatic about a subject about which you have little knowledge.   Change your dogmatic tone and I'll abandon my blunt retorts.

The Christian Bible cannot comment on its own divine inspiration for a very simple reason.   None of the New Testament authors knew they were writing Scripture that would later be canonized.   Indeed, there is no widespread consensus about which 27 works should be set apart for special reverence until around 200 AD and even then these works were not yet canonized as Scripture.
 
Individual writers like Paul and John (of Revelation) claim divine inspiration.  But biblical authority really stands or falls on whether the God inspiring the writers is available today to mystically commune and guide us as He did the prophets and apostles.  In other words, biblical miracles become far more plausible if one's prayers to the biblical God have been marvelously answered.  If one has had no spiritual experiences, then skepticism is the most rational response to Scripture.   In my view, we should think in terms of inspired saints rather than inspired texts.  We should also acknowledge that biblical revelation is incomplete and limited in important ways to the time of its disclosure.  

Some misconceptions of biblical writers lead to thrilling insights about what actually happened.  One of the best examples of this are the apparently inconsistent details of the resurrection narratives of the 4 Gospels.  A little detective work can synthesize these details and create a coherent narrative of these foundational events that is vitually unknown.  If you're interested in this, I can start a new thread laying out the problems and my proposed solution to this awesome puzzle.

Don

I wouldn't go so far as irrational but there are a lot of Christians who firmly believe, whatever version of the Bible they've bought, is true down to every last word printed in that version. Now *that* is irrational. A simple statement backed by experience.


Quote:

If you're interested in this, I can start a new thread laying out the problems and my proposed solution to this awesome puzzle.

Yes, I'd love to have this type of discussion as opposed to how ours started.