I never had much use for non-religious secondary sources back when I was a believer, so I can’t recommend any, but the New Testament isn’t actually that long; you could probably finish it in a week if you read 20-30 chapters a day, and the chapters are short. The first three books, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and to a lesser extent the fourth, John, are all the same; you can probably just pick one (John is probably the most interesting) and read the rest of the NT as is. Whether or not it’s worth your time is entirely up to you. I certainly have no intention of reading it again any time soon.
I think nothing outside of the gospels is of any merit. It is probably worth your time to read the red words in the bible. Jesus was on some real shit, minus all the son of god stuff
Before people get huffy yes I have read the entire bible; it is not “the most beautiful book ever written” nor anything close to that, but Jesus was an interesting dude
You also can not read the bible as if it’s modern English and interpret it as such. Always consider 1. who was talking then, 2. who they were talking to, and 3. the context in which they were speaking at the time.
Like, you can do some really interesting conversations about Neo Platonism and philo-semitism around the time some of the New Testament was being written - Gnosticism undoubtedly comes from Greek philosophy - but many portions of the Hebrew Bible predate Hesiod entirely.
Can you provide any form of argument, or is this some shit you picked up from like Zeitgeist or something.
Didn’t Alan Watts usually talk about (his extremely westernized interpretation of) Zen Buddhism? When has Alan Watts made the strange argument that ancient Israelites were somehow aware of Greek mythology and a specific text that wasn’t even written until at least many of the minor prophets books were written?
When has Alan Watts ever really been focused on the development of the Hebrew Bible and New Testament and it’s relationship to Greek mythology? Do you have a link to his argument?
Edit: Checked out and skimmed Myth & Ritual in Christianity online to see if what you are saying is in there. I strongly suspect that you are seriously misinterpreting ideas related to Jung and the collective unconscious (as does Zeitgeist), but feel free to clarify.
He’s got like hundreds of hours of lectures spanning a 50 year career.
Greece, Ahura Mazda, bhudda, Jesus, mythology, jungian shadow work he touches on just about all of it eventually.
It’s in this body of work I came across things he’d translated from Jesus in the original Greek. As the Old Testament was like 2 thousand years before the new.
We talk about Jesus the way he talked about Moses etc.
Okay. So if you can’t link a lecture where he is specifically making the argument that Hesiod’s Theogony is an influence on the authors of the Bible (which ones? which books?) can you clarify or make specific the connections he draws between the Theogony and specific texts of the Bible?
Like, if anything, the argument you’re making here is more that the “collective unconscious” influenced the Bible.
Which sure, Jungians say that the “collective unconscious” influences everything, but that is meaningless here - you’re making the specific claim that Hesiod influenced the writing of some books of the Bible (which? it wasn’t written by one person, and it wasn’t all written at once). You are also making the secondary claim that Watts also made this claim. Please back these claims up, rather than gesturing vaguely at multiple unrelated religious traditions.
Edit: also, check that wiki link for the timeline of the Bible. “As the Old Testament was like 2 thousand years before the new.” is entirely incorrect.
This is really fascinating. I never heard of this.
Is there a non-religious, ELI5 resource I can read more about this?
I never had much use for non-religious secondary sources back when I was a believer, so I can’t recommend any, but the New Testament isn’t actually that long; you could probably finish it in a week if you read 20-30 chapters a day, and the chapters are short. The first three books, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and to a lesser extent the fourth, John, are all the same; you can probably just pick one (John is probably the most interesting) and read the rest of the NT as is. Whether or not it’s worth your time is entirely up to you. I certainly have no intention of reading it again any time soon.
I think nothing outside of the gospels is of any merit. It is probably worth your time to read the red words in the bible. Jesus was on some real shit, minus all the son of god stuff
Before people get huffy yes I have read the entire bible; it is not “the most beautiful book ever written” nor anything close to that, but Jesus was an interesting dude
You also can not read the bible as if it’s modern English and interpret it as such. Always consider 1. who was talking then, 2. who they were talking to, and 3. the context in which they were speaking at the time.
Dan McClellan videos on YouTube and TikTok are great and accessible discussions of a lot of academic Bible research.
Yeah it’s called Theogany by Hesiod
How is Ancient Greek poetry about the origin of the Greek gods relevant here?
Peep this.
It’s the inspiration for the Bible.
How???
Like, you can do some really interesting conversations about Neo Platonism and philo-semitism around the time some of the New Testament was being written - Gnosticism undoubtedly comes from Greek philosophy - but many portions of the Hebrew Bible predate Hesiod entirely.
Can you provide any form of argument, or is this some shit you picked up from like Zeitgeist or something.
Alan watts
Didn’t Alan Watts usually talk about (his extremely westernized interpretation of) Zen Buddhism? When has Alan Watts made the strange argument that ancient Israelites were somehow aware of Greek mythology and a specific text that wasn’t even written until at least many of the minor prophets books were written?
When has Alan Watts ever really been focused on the development of the Hebrew Bible and New Testament and it’s relationship to Greek mythology? Do you have a link to his argument?
Edit: Checked out and skimmed Myth & Ritual in Christianity online to see if what you are saying is in there. I strongly suspect that you are seriously misinterpreting ideas related to Jung and the collective unconscious (as does Zeitgeist), but feel free to clarify.
He’s got like hundreds of hours of lectures spanning a 50 year career.
Greece, Ahura Mazda, bhudda, Jesus, mythology, jungian shadow work he touches on just about all of it eventually.
It’s in this body of work I came across things he’d translated from Jesus in the original Greek. As the Old Testament was like 2 thousand years before the new. We talk about Jesus the way he talked about Moses etc.
Okay. So if you can’t link a lecture where he is specifically making the argument that Hesiod’s Theogony is an influence on the authors of the Bible (which ones? which books?) can you clarify or make specific the connections he draws between the Theogony and specific texts of the Bible?
Like, if anything, the argument you’re making here is more that the “collective unconscious” influenced the Bible.
Which sure, Jungians say that the “collective unconscious” influences everything, but that is meaningless here - you’re making the specific claim that Hesiod influenced the writing of some books of the Bible (which? it wasn’t written by one person, and it wasn’t all written at once). You are also making the secondary claim that Watts also made this claim. Please back these claims up, rather than gesturing vaguely at multiple unrelated religious traditions.
Edit: also, check that wiki link for the timeline of the Bible. “As the Old Testament was like 2 thousand years before the new.” is entirely incorrect.