Post by ReligionResearcher on Feb 28, 2004 13:36:10 GMT -5
I am not sure what I am or believe right now. I tend to avoid labels, although I have to admit to having a deep seated desire for one. Its just weird not having a label, being nothing, essentially. I lived most of my life with a label, and in certain circles, still wear certain labels, but I always seem to have to give a lengthy explanation following the label, so I've started to realize that I do not really fit any label precisely enough to feel comfortable having one.
I was born & raised ELCA Lutheran in Central Minnesota, USA. I went off to serve my country in the Military, and after a year of training got stationed in Friedburg, Germany. I did not take religion all that seriously, but went to some religious retreat anyway, mainly to get a vacation from the military, and got saved, born again, and eventually figured out that I had become a sort of Evangelical Conservative or Fundamentalist even, but much of my beliefs had to be discovered for I didn't know what I believed really, when I got saved, so I eventually ended up at Bible College, both in Minnesota, and in Seattle, Washington. The school in Minnesota was a Conservative Fundamentalist school and I was bored there, I didn't know why at the time, but in retrospect, I think it was because I agreed with everyone there. The school in Seattle was a Liberal Lutheran school, I went there for my parents sake, and I loved it, I felt challenged, and I really got fired up to study and research, but at the time it was basically a very biased path of merely trying to defend my conservative views against the onslaught of liberal theological thought coming from my professors and some of the other students and it was there that some labeled me as a Fundamentalist, but I liked the term Evangelical, since it didn't sound so forboding and ominous. I then met a guy there who was involved in Jews for Jesus, and for the first time I really pondered the fact that Jesus was a Jew, and what that meant. I knew that, I mean every Christian, pretty much, knows that, but they, as I did not, do not REALLY KNOW that, they don't understand what that really means.
I began to look at the religion that I was raised up in and trained quite well to defend, I was quite the spirited little Orthodox Fundamentalist Christian Apologist, but all that training has backfired, in that I have used that training to throw a critical examining eye upon the claims of Christianity. Also at this time, I discovered a book that delved into the pagan origins of many of the beliefs and practices of the Christian religion, and I really took to studying up on that niche. So I've since left that school(almost 10 years ago now), and studied independently since then, including the Tanakh/hebrew scriptures and the New Testament, too. and other religions around the world, concentrating on the mystery religions of the Middle East and Europe, but also expanding that study beyond those areas as well.
I've recently(last 5 years) discovered the Sacred Name Movement, which is actually much more different than the Messianic Jews I had earlier looked into earlier, than I would have imagined. I started with the House of Yahweh, who I've come to see, and suspected the whole time was not right, but I've taken on a new attitude since my days at Bible College, instead of thinking that I am totally and completely right, I just haven't discovered all of the facts to back up my being right yet(lol), I now try to make a concerted effort to be open minded, open to ALL possibilities. I maintain no sacred cows. I now check into just about everything I run across, which is actually pretty overwhelming, I am not the next Einstein(if you believe he was a Genius), but I hope that I am also at least above average in intelligence. If not, I at least make more of an effort to be than anyone I know.
So, I gave the House of Yahweh the benefit of the doubt, they said many things that were quite compelling, and actually, I was surprised by their level of scholarship, they actually were more scholarly than many Christians I knew or read over the years. But they, like so many people/groups out there, mixed in just enough of the bad, the lies, the falsehoods, with the good, so as to fool most people, but it didn't fool me. I moved on to start checking into other Messianic groups, most of whom are very Torah orientated, and most of whom are big on the Sacred Name.
I felt overwhelmed by all the new stuff I was checking into, so I concentrated on just one issue mainly, and that was I guess, the biggest issue among those people, the Sacred Name, and I read everything I could on it, at my local library, at the three bookstores in town, and on the internet, and I've come to the conclusion(which still, is not 100%, but for now I've decided I went far enough on that one subject) that Yahweh is in fact the Name of the Creator according to the Hebrew Scriptures. We can know how to pronounce The Name, and its the same in all cultures, which means it doesn't matter so much on how it is spelled, as it does how it is pronounced. Now, in saying this, I do not believe that pronouncing the Name correctly brings any special power to the person, or any garbage like that. I am just a person who desires the Truth, and so I seek accuracy in important things like this. I don't want to spell or pronounce the Creator's Name wrong, if I can prevent it. I don't judge others who just don't know any better, but I do judge people who don't know any better for reasons of laziness or closemindedness, etc..
So in that ONE aspect, that I accept the Name of the Creator to be Yahweh, this is where I've sometimes called myself a Yahwist or a Sacred Namer, but the thing is, I'm still researching and searching for answers, for the truth, and I am not fully convinced that any Yahwist or Sacred Name organization has it.
I guess I could say this much, despite all my skepticism, and my renouncing Christianity(I think its thoroughly pagan, and if you are going to go pagan, do it right, drop the mask of christianity and go straight pagan, I have more respect for alot of pagans, than I do Xians, although I still retain a very high amount of respect for Xians, and often times get confused for one, since I defend them when I think that they are being unfairly attacked, and I defend the Scriptures when I think its being unfairly attacked), I still have not been convinced by anyone that the Hebrew Scriptures themselves(the Tanakh at least) are not true. I think that they are quite often misunderstood. And as for the New Testament, I still am not 100% convinced that it is not true, either, but I am much more open to believing that it is not accurate.
I suspect that the New Testament may have been written in Hebrew in large part, originally, and in the translation to greek, was not translated properly. I think that Greek converts paganized the new faith, and may have done it to the point of mistranslating the New Testament. I find Paul's teachings to be either the most misunderstood and/or mistranslated, or the most heretical. I have not come to a conclusion on that yet. I trust the Gospels and the General Epistles the most, but am not sure that they were not mistranslated, too?! I mean, they were written by Jews, to Jews/Israelites, yet Christendom has seemingly translated and interpreted them through Western eyes, through the eyes of pagan greek and egyptian philosophy, and turned Christianity into a Mystery Religion.
I lean towards a theory that all pagan religions can be traced back to one source, the Tower of Babel, and that you can see similarities in all religions around the world, to the Babylonian Mystery Religion, and if you go back far enough into the past, even religions such as Hinduism, Buddism, Islam, etc., can be seen to trace back to Babel. But its just a theory, and I am open to the fact that it might not be true. I also understand that my beliefs, and what I believe about Pagans, and Xians, and the Scriptures, probably puts me at odds with EVERY SINGLE PERSON in this entire forum. I mean, except for maybe a few agnostic skeptics, who simply are not ready to toss out the Bible yet, who will not disagree with me?! There seems to be a lot of pagans in here, by any definition of that word, and a lot of Christians, too, not to mention a lot of atheists and people of the other major religions, and probably a few who follow the minor religions, too?!
I know I tick off Jews of all sorts, most if not all Christians, most atheists, most pagans, etc.. I mean, I know how to get along with people, and in real life I usually get to know the person well enough, before the details of my beliefs reach that line, that when I cross that line, they are already my friend, and so they take my beliefs and accept them as being the crazy beliefs of their friend. But in a place like this, just about 100% of the time, the line is crossed well before any kind of friendship or credibility can be established.
But I just hope that my claiming to want to be as openminded as possible, will be enough for everyone in here to tolerate me. But I can already see that I will bump heads with certain posters, like Graeme. He comes across as closeminded as I used to be. Now I hope that that is not the case, but I doubt it, in my experience, 95-99% of people out there are either clueless, or closeminded. And the remaining 1-5% still can be on occasion, this includes me.
Oh, one more thing about me, in case you haven't already noticed, I tend to be a little too longwinded sometimes. I will try to limit that, though, lol.
But in conclusion, if I HAD to take on some kind of label, I'd say maybe a Seeker of Divine Knowledge and right now a Skeptical Believer in Yahweh & His Scriptures, whatever those may be.
I was born & raised ELCA Lutheran in Central Minnesota, USA. I went off to serve my country in the Military, and after a year of training got stationed in Friedburg, Germany. I did not take religion all that seriously, but went to some religious retreat anyway, mainly to get a vacation from the military, and got saved, born again, and eventually figured out that I had become a sort of Evangelical Conservative or Fundamentalist even, but much of my beliefs had to be discovered for I didn't know what I believed really, when I got saved, so I eventually ended up at Bible College, both in Minnesota, and in Seattle, Washington. The school in Minnesota was a Conservative Fundamentalist school and I was bored there, I didn't know why at the time, but in retrospect, I think it was because I agreed with everyone there. The school in Seattle was a Liberal Lutheran school, I went there for my parents sake, and I loved it, I felt challenged, and I really got fired up to study and research, but at the time it was basically a very biased path of merely trying to defend my conservative views against the onslaught of liberal theological thought coming from my professors and some of the other students and it was there that some labeled me as a Fundamentalist, but I liked the term Evangelical, since it didn't sound so forboding and ominous. I then met a guy there who was involved in Jews for Jesus, and for the first time I really pondered the fact that Jesus was a Jew, and what that meant. I knew that, I mean every Christian, pretty much, knows that, but they, as I did not, do not REALLY KNOW that, they don't understand what that really means.
I began to look at the religion that I was raised up in and trained quite well to defend, I was quite the spirited little Orthodox Fundamentalist Christian Apologist, but all that training has backfired, in that I have used that training to throw a critical examining eye upon the claims of Christianity. Also at this time, I discovered a book that delved into the pagan origins of many of the beliefs and practices of the Christian religion, and I really took to studying up on that niche. So I've since left that school(almost 10 years ago now), and studied independently since then, including the Tanakh/hebrew scriptures and the New Testament, too. and other religions around the world, concentrating on the mystery religions of the Middle East and Europe, but also expanding that study beyond those areas as well.
I've recently(last 5 years) discovered the Sacred Name Movement, which is actually much more different than the Messianic Jews I had earlier looked into earlier, than I would have imagined. I started with the House of Yahweh, who I've come to see, and suspected the whole time was not right, but I've taken on a new attitude since my days at Bible College, instead of thinking that I am totally and completely right, I just haven't discovered all of the facts to back up my being right yet(lol), I now try to make a concerted effort to be open minded, open to ALL possibilities. I maintain no sacred cows. I now check into just about everything I run across, which is actually pretty overwhelming, I am not the next Einstein(if you believe he was a Genius), but I hope that I am also at least above average in intelligence. If not, I at least make more of an effort to be than anyone I know.
So, I gave the House of Yahweh the benefit of the doubt, they said many things that were quite compelling, and actually, I was surprised by their level of scholarship, they actually were more scholarly than many Christians I knew or read over the years. But they, like so many people/groups out there, mixed in just enough of the bad, the lies, the falsehoods, with the good, so as to fool most people, but it didn't fool me. I moved on to start checking into other Messianic groups, most of whom are very Torah orientated, and most of whom are big on the Sacred Name.
I felt overwhelmed by all the new stuff I was checking into, so I concentrated on just one issue mainly, and that was I guess, the biggest issue among those people, the Sacred Name, and I read everything I could on it, at my local library, at the three bookstores in town, and on the internet, and I've come to the conclusion(which still, is not 100%, but for now I've decided I went far enough on that one subject) that Yahweh is in fact the Name of the Creator according to the Hebrew Scriptures. We can know how to pronounce The Name, and its the same in all cultures, which means it doesn't matter so much on how it is spelled, as it does how it is pronounced. Now, in saying this, I do not believe that pronouncing the Name correctly brings any special power to the person, or any garbage like that. I am just a person who desires the Truth, and so I seek accuracy in important things like this. I don't want to spell or pronounce the Creator's Name wrong, if I can prevent it. I don't judge others who just don't know any better, but I do judge people who don't know any better for reasons of laziness or closemindedness, etc..
So in that ONE aspect, that I accept the Name of the Creator to be Yahweh, this is where I've sometimes called myself a Yahwist or a Sacred Namer, but the thing is, I'm still researching and searching for answers, for the truth, and I am not fully convinced that any Yahwist or Sacred Name organization has it.
I guess I could say this much, despite all my skepticism, and my renouncing Christianity(I think its thoroughly pagan, and if you are going to go pagan, do it right, drop the mask of christianity and go straight pagan, I have more respect for alot of pagans, than I do Xians, although I still retain a very high amount of respect for Xians, and often times get confused for one, since I defend them when I think that they are being unfairly attacked, and I defend the Scriptures when I think its being unfairly attacked), I still have not been convinced by anyone that the Hebrew Scriptures themselves(the Tanakh at least) are not true. I think that they are quite often misunderstood. And as for the New Testament, I still am not 100% convinced that it is not true, either, but I am much more open to believing that it is not accurate.
I suspect that the New Testament may have been written in Hebrew in large part, originally, and in the translation to greek, was not translated properly. I think that Greek converts paganized the new faith, and may have done it to the point of mistranslating the New Testament. I find Paul's teachings to be either the most misunderstood and/or mistranslated, or the most heretical. I have not come to a conclusion on that yet. I trust the Gospels and the General Epistles the most, but am not sure that they were not mistranslated, too?! I mean, they were written by Jews, to Jews/Israelites, yet Christendom has seemingly translated and interpreted them through Western eyes, through the eyes of pagan greek and egyptian philosophy, and turned Christianity into a Mystery Religion.
I lean towards a theory that all pagan religions can be traced back to one source, the Tower of Babel, and that you can see similarities in all religions around the world, to the Babylonian Mystery Religion, and if you go back far enough into the past, even religions such as Hinduism, Buddism, Islam, etc., can be seen to trace back to Babel. But its just a theory, and I am open to the fact that it might not be true. I also understand that my beliefs, and what I believe about Pagans, and Xians, and the Scriptures, probably puts me at odds with EVERY SINGLE PERSON in this entire forum. I mean, except for maybe a few agnostic skeptics, who simply are not ready to toss out the Bible yet, who will not disagree with me?! There seems to be a lot of pagans in here, by any definition of that word, and a lot of Christians, too, not to mention a lot of atheists and people of the other major religions, and probably a few who follow the minor religions, too?!
I know I tick off Jews of all sorts, most if not all Christians, most atheists, most pagans, etc.. I mean, I know how to get along with people, and in real life I usually get to know the person well enough, before the details of my beliefs reach that line, that when I cross that line, they are already my friend, and so they take my beliefs and accept them as being the crazy beliefs of their friend. But in a place like this, just about 100% of the time, the line is crossed well before any kind of friendship or credibility can be established.
But I just hope that my claiming to want to be as openminded as possible, will be enough for everyone in here to tolerate me. But I can already see that I will bump heads with certain posters, like Graeme. He comes across as closeminded as I used to be. Now I hope that that is not the case, but I doubt it, in my experience, 95-99% of people out there are either clueless, or closeminded. And the remaining 1-5% still can be on occasion, this includes me.
Oh, one more thing about me, in case you haven't already noticed, I tend to be a little too longwinded sometimes. I will try to limit that, though, lol.
But in conclusion, if I HAD to take on some kind of label, I'd say maybe a Seeker of Divine Knowledge and right now a Skeptical Believer in Yahweh & His Scriptures, whatever those may be.
to a certain extent.