Recently I was reading through something I wrote and I found some typos and errors (and there may be some in this blog and other blogs I have written). This made me think if I can make mistakes writing on an electronic keyboard, with spelling and grammar check, etc., couldn't errors be possible with the canonized books of the bible that was handwritten, which were copies of copies, and if someone in an earlier copy made a mistake, an addition or deletion, how can you know what the original oral saying really said? It appears that Jesus of Nazareth never wrote anything himself so what we have in the Gospels was passed on orally. For example,from Luke 1:1-4 “1. Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, 2. just as they were "handed down" to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. 3. With this in mind, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, I too decided to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, 4. so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught.”(NIV) So I thought about how things that are passed on orally like a game which I call telephone. According to Wikipedia (so take this with a grain of salt) "In the game variously known as Chinese whispers, Telephone, Grapevine, Broken Telephone, Whisper Down the Lane, Gossip, Le téléphone arabe (French for "Arab Phone"), Stille Post (German for "Silent Post"), Gioco del Telefono (Italian for "Telephone Game"), Telefone sem fio (Portuguese for "Cordless Phone") and Pass the Message, the first player whispers a phrase or sentence to the next player. Each player successively whispers what that player believes he or she heard to the next. The last player announces the statement to the entire group. Errors typically accumulate in the retelling, so the statement announced by the last player differs significantly, and often amusingly, from the one uttered by the first. The game is often played by children as a party game or in the playground. It is often invoked as a metaphor for cumulative error, especially the inaccuracies as rumors or gossip spread, or, more generally, for the unreliability of human recollection. As many players as possible line up such that they can whisper to their immediate neighbors but not hear any players farther away. The player at the beginning of the line thinks of a phrase, and whispers it as quietly as possible to his or her neighbor. The neighbor then passes on the message to the next player to the best of his or her ability. The passing continues in this fashion until it reaches the player at the end of the line, who calls out the message he or she received. If the game has been 'successful', the final message will bear little or no resemblance to the original, because of the cumulative effect of mistakes along the line. Deliberately changing the phrase is often considered cheating, but if the starting phrase is poorly chosen, there may be disappointingly little natural change. One variation known as "operator" allows each listener one chance to ask his or her neighbor for a repetition, as if assistance from the line operator were available by calling that word."
Yet Christians and other Theist (Jews, Muslims, etc.) want us to believe that their sacred scriptures are inerrant, that is, without error. This is absurd! I understand the need for certainty as stated in Luke 1:4 "so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught.", but I think it is more probable that certainty in an absolute sense is either unknowable or doesn't exist. As I wrote in the past, I think reasonableness is more likely than certainty, which is we can know some things but not all things; we have to allow room for uncertainty. If we knew everything what would be the purpose of living? This is why I think the Vedanta idea of Tat Vam Asi (That thou art) or you're IT as Alan Watts wrote in The Book: The Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are, is reasonable. In the Book Alan Watts uses the Vedanta philosophy to illustrate the Pantheistic idea that the universe and everything in it is God playing hide and seek, and God deliberately forgets that he or she is really running the show and that he or she is god or IT, for if you knew it, IT would get bored and disinterested quickly, for if god knew everything before it happened, what incentive would god have to continue to exist? And maybe that is what the big bang was, the Will or thing in itself forgetting who it was, for by destroying the singularity it was reborn into everything. I find this more reasonable than the Judeo-Christian worldview of a god who is “perfect” having a need to create for why would a perfect creator need to create anything, wouldn’t this mean the creator lacked or desired something, and therefore was not perfect? Think about it...
