Re: [asa] Sequencing the Bible in importance

It's certainly true that some parts of the Bible are more important than
others. Since the fundamental purpose of the canon of scripture is to
witness to Christ, those parts that do so most clearly are the heart of
scripture. There will be differences among Christians on just what books
constitute the "canon within the canon," but there's no question that Romans
is more important than Nehemiah (e.g.)

I think we have to be a bit careful in getting down to the level of
individual verses or sentences however. The unity of scripture & the places
of various writings in the canon are important too.

& Moorad is right that the significance of Gen.1 & 2 relative to other parts
of scripture shouldn't be overestimated. In the rest of the OT & NT
Gen.12-50 and Exodus plays more important roles Genesis 1-11.

Shalom
George
http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/
----- Original Message -----
From: "Alexanian, Moorad" <alexanian@uncw.edu>
To: "AmericanScientificAffiliation" <asa@calvin.edu>
Sent: Thursday, July 05, 2007 8:05 AM
Subject: [asa] Sequencing the Bible in importance

In my own mind there is no way to address the issues that are being raised
without characterizing the Bible into segments, say verses, and indicating
the degree of importance of each segment. It is clear that this
characterization may be in dispute, but it certainly reduces the areas of
debate considerably to important verses.

Surely, the most important verses deal with whom Jesus the Christ is and
what He accomplished on the cross. In fact, such verses would clarify what
it means to be a Christian. Of course, there may be all sorts of arguments
about even these, very few verses. Nonetheless, one would the settling the
most important biblical issue. Afterwards, one can select the next level of
importance and the verses that go with it.

I am sure using this scheme, the questions of origins would be pretty much
in the bottom of importance. Therefore, I do not see why all the arguments
about the meaning of Genesis 1 and 2. Note that our understanding of
Scripture increases with time, for instance, as prophesies are fulfilled,
thus increasing the areas of agreement between differing lines of thinking.

I am sure someone has taken this approach in the past and perhaps some in
the list can enlighten us with such references or comments.

Moorad

To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@calvin.edu with
"unsubscribe asa" (no quotes) as the body of the message.

To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@calvin.edu with
"unsubscribe asa" (no quotes) as the body of the message.
Received on Thu Jul 5 13:16:42 2007