It's often worth it to go back to the original Hebrew, or Greek, etc to catch nuances in meaning.
Agree wholeheartedly. But frankly, most people around here only know "Jesus loves you. Pray to him." And I can't say I blame them, many of these poor folk live hard-working lives. Not much time to learn Greek or Hebrew.
Then again, I just had a interesting talk with some farmers recently about the myth of "hard working" modern farmers. Most of the share-croppers around here with good equpiment and genetically modified crops work only a few weeks out of the year. Granted, unless you have more than 10,000 acres, you aren't going to make much, but things aren't that expensive around here either.
Well, getting really off topic here. Then again, others are talking about flipping skirts at Catholic school ... so
Chrome
*smile* And you run into plenty of folks who try to think "the Fall" of mankind as depicted in the book of Genesis had something to do with sex. When reality of course is much more subtle, and infinitely more interesting.
Joseph Campbell sees the serpent as a symbol of rebirth, left over from the old pagan religions, which somehow snaked its way into the tale. The shedding of the old hide, etc. My old theology teacher thought the story of Cain and Abel was a remnant of a much older tale of a sacrifice made for the founding of a city. Comparative mythology is also a wealth of interesting things. Ah, to have much more time....
