WHAT I LEARNED IN DR. BECKS CLASS

 with all the classes offered at TLU I have enjoyed theology the most professor beck teaches like no other person i have meet. instead of being focused on the grade like most people at this college I've been focusing on the learning. i can say i understand more about the bible.

this is a paper about the religious  language i wrote for professor  Beck.

Nature of Religious Language

Tillich explains that the language of faith shouldn’t be taken only in a literal sense. To understand what that means, you must first understand what the language of faith is. The language of faith is the use of myths and symbols in biblical and other religious content. One also has to know what myth and symbol mean and their function. Myths are symbols of faith combined in stories about divine human encounters. Symbols are used to open dimensions and elements of reality and elements to the soul. Criticism of myths would be inappropriate if it, would mean the removal of the myth but removal of the myth can never happen because they are forms of human consciousness. Because myths form man’s spiritual life they cannot be removed or replaced. They can only be said to be “broken” myths. The act of criticizing the myth to break it is demythologization and “the primitive mythological consciousness resists the attempt to interpret the myth of myth.” By breaking the myth it makes some people think that it loses its convincing power. The thought of resisting is because some are afraid of taking the Bible out of literal context. In thinking literally, symbols lose their ability to look beyond themselves into deeper concept. Literalism also deprives God of his intimacy by making him seem to act as a being acting in time and space, affecting the course of events and being affected by them.

There are two types of literalism the natural and the reactive. The natural type is when the literal can’t distinguish itself from mythical elements of religion. In criticizing myths people can open up their faith and learn. This brings people to the reactive stage of literalism when a person might use repression to stay in a state of literalism. It is important to read the Bible critically because some material in the Bible is contradicting and harmful. The text of the Bible has racist and sexist material, but this material shouldn’t be destroyed or token out, but repudiated. The Bible has been written by men who put their emphasis and opinion on certain content. Paul was contradicted in Timothy 2:11-15 by someone writing in his name by saying woman weren’t permitted to teach or preach the gospel. Without repudiating the material and viewing it critically, injustice will continue to happen by allowing this to be taught to others. The importance of reputing things is that we learn to read the Bible critically so that harmful material doesn’t keep harming people.

I myself on a continuum between literalism and totally critical analysis stand in more of the critical analysis side. This is because I understand that some things in the Bible can’t be taken only literally. While critically looking at some stories of the Bible, I can see that it is meant to teach you a deeper meaning than what is just put there to read. The Bible has messages for oppressed people that can only be understood if you were to look for the deeper meaning in the text.