[Margaret Pilkington]

Understanding the bible is a monumental challenge.
Of that, there is no doubt.
All language is subjective(though Eric you may not agree with that)......what makes it subjective is our own experiences of life and experiences of how language is used.
Also the fact that this book has been translated from the original language many times must cloud the issues.
In the original transcripts of the bible there may have been words which had no real translatable equivalent, so the translator may have put in a word that he thought roughly matched the meaning inferred.
So it goes.
The Bible may be an interesting book to read(?) but the text cannot be taken literally because of what I have mentioned before.
A recent bible basher on here was adept at quoting stuff from the bible. He told us that he lived his life according to the bible....he doesn't. He lives his life according to his understanding, his experience of what he thinks this book means. There is a subtle difference