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Source: (consider it) Thread: David and Bathsheeba
Gee D
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Today's RCL OT reading for us was the passage from 2 Samuel, discussed here beforehand. What was striking this morning was the effect on our reader. Most certainly, this was not the first time she had heard the passage and she had probably read it in at least one previous service; today, when she reached verse 15, she stopped briefly and was obviously shocked at David's actions and thoughts. She was still shaken when we chatted at morning tea about it.

The preacher took the passage from John 6 as his subject, but in the course of the sermon talked of his horror at the OT passage being read in church at all, and how dreadful was David's behaviour.

What happened at your service this morning?

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Not every Anglican in Sydney is Sydney Anglican

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venbede
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Another jolly good reason to use the related OT reading.

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Man was made for joy and woe;
And when this we rightly know,
Thro' the world we safely go.

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Pigwidgeon

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Another jolly good reason to read through your assigned reading in advance.

(Our OT reading was 2 Kings 4:42-44.)

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"...that is generally a matter for Pigwidgeon, several other consenting adults, a bottle of cheap Gin and the odd giraffe."
~Tortuf

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venbede
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The C of E lectionary give 2 Samuel 11.1-5 as the continuous reading.

But certainly I'm amazed that a reader can't be bothered to read the reading through first, even if the are last minute replacement.

--------------------
Man was made for joy and woe;
And when this we rightly know,
Thro' the world we safely go.

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BroJames
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quote:
Originally posted by Gee D:
The preacher took the passage from John 6 as his subject, but in the course of the sermon talked of his horror at the OT passage being read in church at all, and how dreadful was David's behaviour.

What happened at your service this morning?

We heard the 'related' OT reading - one of Elusha's miracles with a link to the feeding of the 5,000. IMHO, unless you are going to preach seriously and (semi-) continuously on the OT, then you should use the 'related' OT reading. If the preacher had chosen to tackle the OT reading, then there is a lot of good homiletical material in it. But it needs careful thinking and careful handling.
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Baptist Trainfan
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We don't usually use the RCL, but as it happens we did read the Bathsheba passage last Sunday, as an illustration of the wide-ranging consequences that can happen if even one person allows temptation to overcome them. There are all sorts of issues of lust, power, deceitfulness and murder in the tale.

I agree that it is a horrible story - but it also reflects what people are really like. To suggest that it should never be read in church runs the danger of confining one's faith to certain issues while ignoring others. Interestingly neither this story (nor the one about Jael, Sisera and the tent-peg murder) were considered "off limits" when I was a 12-year old member of a Bible class back in the 60s.

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Vaticanchic
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For the man "after God's own heart", David's record with women is a scandalous story - but not as scandalous as the Gospel.

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"Sink, Burn or Take Her a Prize"

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venbede
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Jesus' life and message may be scandalous, but he didn't have a dependent bumped off because he'd got his wife preggers.

I'd be only too glad to have any OT readings at the main Sunday service, and David and Bathesheba is not the place to start.

--------------------
Man was made for joy and woe;
And when this we rightly know,
Thro' the world we safely go.

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Enoch
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I don't approve of those who would want to bowdlerise the Bible. I agree with Baptist Trainfan. There is valuable teaching to be gained from the less admirable parts of the scriptures. Even the fact that they are included is significant. They weren't avoided when I was growing up either.

Incidentally, have shipmates noticed that there are four women mentioned in the genealogy in Matthew 1. Three are named, even though two of those are Tamar and Rahab. The fourth is described simply as 'his mother had been the wife of Uriah', even though everybody knew who she was and what her name was.

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Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson

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Vaticanchic
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Jesus - God incarnate - is himself a scandal to the wisdom of the world, before you even begin to regard his actions & teaching. David is a man after God's own heart - this is not in doubt - the question for the preacher is why.

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"Sink, Burn or Take Her a Prize"

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Lamb Chopped
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I don't think it's a bad thing for the readings to shock or otherwise affect people. Surely we want listeners to engage with the text?

We regularly taught D & B to all our Sunday School kids, along with similar "no no" stories. After all, most of them are watching far worse on TV.

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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!

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Alan Cresswell

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The biggest issue for me, as far as use of the story in worship goes, is that the RCL splits the story in two and leaves the completion until the following week. When Nathan comes along with his parable about the rich man taking the sheep from the poor man David immediately condemns his own actions. The story includes Nathan coming and saying that the story is worse than just David committing the sins of lust, rape and murder.

I preached a few weeks ago, and had an earlier part of the story of David as the OT passage. I managed to fit that in quite easily as saying that Davids achievements were because the Lord was with him - and, this was despite the serious imperfections in his character. This story is one of the clearest examples of those imperfections.

I'm not seeing any way to fit the second half of this story into my sermon next week. And, so, loath as I am to not preach on the texts read I feel that I will effectively ignore it altogether.

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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.

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Jengie jon

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You also realise that if Bathsheba is doing what the Bible says she is doing, then the outcome is highly unlikely, as most women are not fertile immediately after their period.

So why does the writer set it at this time? To suggest this is more than a one night stand? Is Bathsheba playing for power? This idea would be in keeping with her behaviour at other times. Some other superstition concerned with having sex immediately after a period?

David is clearly badly behaved but Bathsheba is as complex a character as he and we do her wrong as a woman if we consign her to the docile innocent wife role overruled by a powerful monarch.

If we look at more of his wives, they seem to be willing to do a lot to be the wife of David. These women are proactive in building their future. This scene is the entry of the second powerful wife, the first being Abigail of Carmel. It is the battle between these women and their offspring for power that will shape the rest of David's reign. Further Abigail comes to represent Hebron with David's Judean heritage and Bathsheba Jerusalem with the political elite.

It is through these turbulent waters of human politics that God's will functions.

Jengie

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"To violate a persons ability to distinguish fact from fantasy is the epistemological equivalent of rape." Noretta Koertge

Back to my blog

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Lamb Chopped
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I hate to rain on a great post, but the post-menstruation bath took place one week after one's period ended--in other words, on or close to Day 14 of the menstrual cycle, which is the average day on which women are most likely to get pregnant.

quote:
Leviticus 15:19-30 (ESV)

19 “When a woman has a discharge, and the discharge in her body is blood, she shall be in her menstrual impurity for seven days, and whoever touches her shall be unclean until the evening....

25 “If a woman has a discharge of blood for many days, not at the time of her menstrual impurity, or if she has a discharge beyond the time of her impurity, all the days of the discharge she shall continue in uncleanness. ... 28 But if she is cleansed of her discharge, she shall count for herself seven days, and after that she shall be clean."

I take that last verse as meaning that you don't start counting until the bleeding is over, whether it's a normal period or some kind of breakthrough bleeding. Which in the case of an average-length period leaves most women at the height of their fertility.

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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!

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Pomona
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Young children generally pay more attention to David and Bathsheba/Jael and Sisera/the countless dodgy characters in Judges and elsewhere in the OT - they are awful, interesting, sometimes darkly funny. Just like real life. That's all the more reason to read them in church.

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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]

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mousethief

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quote:
Originally posted by Gee D:
Today's RCL OT reading for us was the passage from 2 Samuel, discussed here beforehand.

Which would be what?

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Gee D
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quote:
Originally posted by venbede:
The C of E lectionary give 2 Samuel 11.1-5 as the continuous reading.

But certainly I'm amazed that a reader can't be bothered to read the reading through first, even if the are last minute replacement.

I don't know how you reach the comment in your second paragraph. My OP noted that this would not have been the first time our reader had heard the passage and that this may not have been the first time she had read it herself. And knowing here, she would most certainly have read it during the week before, and rehearsed it. But on this occasion, the enormity of David's behaviour really did hit her at verse 15.

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mousethief

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quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
Originally posted by Gee D:
Today's RCL OT reading for us was the passage from 2 Samuel, discussed here beforehand.

Which would be what?
Chapter? Verses? Anybody? Bueller? Bueller?

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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...

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Gee D
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Sorry Mousethief , I suppose that you as Orthodox don't get the RCL and follow another calendar. Yesterday's OT reading was 2 Samuel 11:1-15.


Alan Creswell, our sermon yesterday was almost entirely on both limbs of the Gospel reading - joining the loaves and fishes with the walking on water. In the past, we have had a sermon on this chapter alone, and another on ch 12, relating it back to the great imperfections shown by David - and all of us.

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Not every Anglican in Sydney is Sydney Anglican

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venbede
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quote:
Originally posted by Gee D:
quote:
Originally posted by venbede:
The C of E lectionary give 2 Samuel 11.1-5 as the continuous reading.

But certainly I'm amazed that a reader can't be bothered to read the reading through first, even if the are last minute replacement.

I don't know how you reach the comment in your second paragraph. My OP noted that this would not have been the first time our reader had heard the passage and that this may not have been the first time she had read it herself. And knowing here, she would most certainly have read it during the week before, and rehearsed it. But on this occasion, the enormity of David's behaviour really did hit her at verse 15.
I apologise for misunderstanding.

--------------------
Man was made for joy and woe;
And when this we rightly know,
Thro' the world we safely go.

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Gramps49
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The Lutheran Lectionary had 2 Kings 42-44 as an alternative reading. We went with that one because it fits into the Gospel reading nicely.
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Enoch
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quote:
Originally posted by Pomona:
Young children generally pay more attention to David and Bathsheba/Jael and Sisera/the countless dodgy characters in Judges and elsewhere in the OT - they are awful, interesting, sometimes darkly funny. Just like real life. That's all the more reason to read them in church.

[Overused]

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Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson

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Karl: Liberal Backslider
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2 Sam 12:1-22 is much, much more disturbing. We have there a God who kills children to punish their parents.

A human who did that we'd call a complete and utter bastard.

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Might as well ask the bloody cat.

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mr cheesy
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quote:
Originally posted by Pomona:
Young children generally pay more attention to David and Bathsheba/Jael and Sisera/the countless dodgy characters in Judges and elsewhere in the OT - they are awful, interesting, sometimes darkly funny. Just like real life. That's all the more reason to read them in church.

I'm sorry, you know people in real life who murder the husband of a woman they fancy for a night of passion and then you tell it to children as a funny story?

The only saving grace of this passage is that the context is so alien as to be essentially impossible for a child to imagine being real life.

But the fact that we think the OT testament passages are relevant to young children shows a lot about us and our children. The great lie about teaching the bible to children is that the stories are appropriate for children. Clearly, on the whole, they are not.

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arse

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Alan Cresswell

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So, you want us to present the Gospel according to Disney?

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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.

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mr cheesy
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quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
So, you want us to present the Gospel according to Disney?

Nope, I want bible classes to stop for young children. They're damaging to the child and of no help to the faith community.

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arse

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Morgan
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quote:
Originally posted by Gee D:
Today's RCL OT reading for us was the passage from 2 Samuel, discussed here beforehand. What was striking this morning was the effect on our reader.

Our reader was also deeply affected. On Sunday morning before the service she told me she had read through the passage a number of times and still spent a sleepless night at the thought of reading it aloud to the congregation.

She described it as shocking, embarrassing and horrifying that David was a man to do such things and that it felt shocking, embarrassing and horrifying to read them aloud.

Part of the shock is in the reading aloud. We (or some of us) read equivalent or worse to ourselves, even in the daily news but we seldom read such things aloud to a group of people we know.

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Vaticanchic
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The ministry of reading Scripture in public is a serious & often difficult one, yes.

Bathsheba isn't the first of David's wives whose former husband "mysteriously" dies, of course.

The fact that "bad" people can be as much engaged with God as "good" is incomprehensible to contemporary culture, but it shouldn't be too much of a surprise to Christians.

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"Sink, Burn or Take Her a Prize"

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Alan Cresswell

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quote:
Originally posted by mr cheesy:
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
So, you want us to present the Gospel according to Disney?

Nope, I want bible classes to stop for young children. They're damaging to the child and of no help to the faith community.
I suppose that depends on what you mean by "bible class", and "young children". But there is, I suppose, a simple spectrum of options ranging from not telling them any Bible stories, through telling them some selected stories, to letting them hear all the stories in the Bible. If you're opting for "some" then where is your line saying what is or is not acceptable? There is also a sideline of re-writing the stories so that they become acceptable.

Do we really want our children to grow up thinking that the Bible is a set of nice stories? The Flood becomes cute, fluffy animals marching in two by two, with a colourful rainbow at the end. David is the singing shepherd boy who becomes king, slaying the big bad giant along the way. And, they all live happily ever after.

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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.

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Enoch
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quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
So, you want us to present the Gospel according to Disney?

Another [Overused]

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Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson

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mr cheesy
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quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
I suppose that depends on what you mean by "bible class", and "young children". But there is, I suppose, a simple spectrum of options ranging from not telling them any Bible stories, through telling them some selected stories, to letting them hear all the stories in the Bible. If you're opting for "some" then where is your line saying what is or is not acceptable? There is also a sideline of re-writing the stories so that they become acceptable.

I have yet to hear a Sunday School class for young children I thought was acceptable. For me, lessons on Samson, David and Joshua are all inappropriate. If we wouldn't let them hear these stories in videos and books, why is it suddenly acceptable in a church context?

quote:
Do we really want our children to grow up thinking that the Bible is a set of nice stories? The Flood becomes cute, fluffy animals marching in two by two, with a colourful rainbow at the end. David is the singing shepherd boy who becomes king, slaying the big bad giant along the way. And, they all live happily ever after.
Nope. The bible is for adults, the idea that it is in any way for children is totally wrong.

Sunday schools have long tried to shoehorn inappropriate bible stories into children's lives, and it is about time we woke up and realised the effect it is having.

There are plenty of other things we can teach children usefully on a Sunday morning, but most are missed in the infatuation with getting them to colour in soldiers and sticking things onto other things.

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arse

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Ad Orientem
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What effect is it having then?
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I remember reading that one of Queen Victoria's Ladies-in-Waiting tried to cheer the Queen up by remarking 'How interesting it will be in Heaven, ma'am, to meet all those interesting people like St Paul and King David!' The Queen was not amused. 'I will NOT receive King David. His conduct with the wife of Uriah the Hittite was disgraceful.' End of conversation.

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'I think I think, therefore I think I am'

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mr cheesy
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quote:
Originally posted by Ad Orientem:
What effect is it having then?

Depends on the child - but ranges from nightmares through to disgust, and rising numbers of children leaving the church at first opportunity.

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arse

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L'organist
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I'm reminded of a remark attributed Eiza, Countess of Erroll, Lady of the Bedchamber to Queen Victoria, when she went to see Antony and Cleopatra
quote:
How different, how very different, from the home-life of our own dear Queen.


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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet

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Beeswax Altar
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I preached mainly on David and Bathsheba.

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Losing sleep is something you want to avoid, if possible.
-Og: King of Bashan

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Ad Orientem
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quote:
Originally posted by mr cheesy:
quote:
Originally posted by Ad Orientem:
What effect is it having then?

Depends on the child - but ranges from nightmares through to disgust, and rising numbers of children leaving the church at first opportunity.
Gordon Bennett! Seriously?
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Laurelin
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quote:
Originally posted by mr cheesy:
Nope. The bible is for adults, the idea that it is in any way for children is totally wrong.

I don't agree with this at all. The gospels aren't suitable for children (as an example)?

I went to a Sunday School which made Bible learning fun, lively and interactive. None of it traumatised me. There were other issues to do with my childhood religion, but the Sunday School's method of Bible teaching was definitely not part of the problem. Indeed, it was the only bearable part of church!

If children can cope with fairytales, many of which have very dark origins, they can handle some of the Bible. I did, and I was a sensitive little thing.

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Moo

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My mother used to tell a story about the time one of my brothers offered to read the Bible to her. He chose an OT passage that was full of sexual references. After every verse or two, he would remark, "I don't get that." A bit later, "I don't get that either." I think most children would realize that David had done wrong, but they wouldn't understand all the ramifications of the story by a long shot.

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mr cheesy
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quote:
Originally posted by Laurelin:
I don't agree with this at all. The gospels aren't suitable for children (as an example)?


I was specifically talking about the OT, but there is also very little from the NT which is relevant to a small child.

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bib
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I must admit that I was stunned that this was the OT reading for the day. To launch into the story without preamble or explanation especially when there is no sermon addressing the reading is likely to create a stumbling stone for members of the congregation, particularly those who are new in their faith. In my church the sermon was on the Gospel reading of the loaves and fishes and nothing was said re the OT reading. I spoke to the priest after the service who said he actually agreed with my viewpoint and said he wished another reading had been substituted as he felt some readings should not be read out loud in church without proper discussion.

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DangerousDeacon
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The Dean of Newcastle did a very good job on this one (I am currently south on a visit and was in the congregation at Christ Church Cathedral, Newcastle).

The sermon contrasted the greed of David (with some use of next weeks OT reading, which is Nathan condemning David) and contrasted it with the generosity of the boy who sacrificed his bread and fishes for the use of all in the Gospel. In the first case a man with everything took everything - wife, life, future - from Uriah. In the second case a boy with almost nothing, gave all that he had - and this was transformed into a blessing for all.

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Ad Orientem
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Eh? Are people really suggesting withholding parts of the scriptures because we think some might not be able to handle them?
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LeRoc

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# 3216

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quote:
bib:
To launch into the story without preamble or explanation

Who stopped you from having a preamble or explanation?

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Ad Orientem
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I'm not even sure that it needs a preamble or whatever. Surely everyone can work out that David sinned and doesn't the scripture even say that the Lord was displeased with David because of what he had done?
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Anselmina
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quote:
Originally posted by mr cheesy:
quote:
Originally posted by Laurelin:
I don't agree with this at all. The gospels aren't suitable for children (as an example)?


I was specifically talking about the OT, but there is also very little from the NT which is relevant to a small child.
Thank Christ my Sunday School teachers and parents didn't think like you. They had enough common sense to teach Bible stories in age appropriate fashions; like any sensible intelligent parent or teacher would. I'll grant you, there must be exceptions.

But generally speaking, not many Primary One teachers start their students on geometry or logarithims; and few reception classes introduce their four year olds to the complexities of sexual relationships and the use of contraception. I've yet to come across a Sunday School teacher or system who starts their tots and toddlers on the rape, adultery, annihilation and other strong-meat texts of that sort in the Bible.

I'm delighted to say that I - along with most of my contemporaries, so far as I could tell - remained fairly untraumatized with basic tellings of Christ healing people, being kind and loving the world. And of course the more gory OT stuff - and the crucifixion stuff, too - was played down. What moron would try to gross out an inexperienced, vulnerable young child with unexpurgated adult revelations of sex and violence. Obviously I was fortunate enough not to have morons doing Sunday School, or morons for parents.

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Anselmina
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quote:
Originally posted by Jengie jon:


David is clearly badly behaved but Bathsheba is as complex a character as he and we do her wrong as a woman if we consign her to the docile innocent wife role overruled by a powerful monarch.


Jengie

I've always thought that the writing of the text was interesting because virtually none of Bathsheba's personal thoughts, motives, desires or reactions were mentioned. It's as if - bearing in mind the context, the era, the authorship - anything she might have thought, experienced or wished for herself was pretty much irrelevant to the story.

It is possible she was in collusion with David, and ambitious to be one of the king's many, many wives. But there is nothing that suggests this in scripture, one way or another. She is closer to being a cipher for the vagaries of David's mortal weakness and his godly repentance in the following chapters, than she is as a full-formed character with a will and purpose of her own.

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Lamb Chopped
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I think you're right, and her cipherness is a good reflection of the way David himself treated her--as a cipher with no wishes or feelings of her own. But after he came to his senses, we see him comforting her (as if she mattered now!), and she eventually comes into her own as the mother of the heir and a political power in the court.

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Beeswax Altar
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quote:
Originally posted by bib:
I must admit that I was stunned that this was the OT reading for the day. To launch into the story without preamble or explanation especially when there is no sermon addressing the reading is likely to create a stumbling stone for members of the congregation, particularly those who are new in their faith. In my church the sermon was on the Gospel reading of the loaves and fishes and nothing was said re the OT reading. I spoke to the priest after the service who said he actually agreed with my viewpoint and said he wished another reading had been substituted as he felt some readings should not be read out loud in church without proper discussion.

Why does this story need proper discussion? Why didn't he discuss it if in fact it needed proper discussion? Why would David and Bathsheba cause members particularly those new in their faith to stumble?

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Lamb Chopped
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Well, thanks for shocking me awake this morning, some of you! You did a better job than the coffee, Mr Cheesy, by painting the Bible as full of horrifying stories that will scar children for life. Seriously, have you looked at TV lately--even TV meant for children? Read any fairytales? Looked at any tween and YA books (God forbid )?

I have a highly sensitive child, and yet he is not the delicate little flower who can't cope with David and Bathsheba. Heck, half the kids I've taught in Sunday school have adultery going on in their own families (not generally churchgoing themselves, pity). Their lives are being ripped apart by broken parental marriages--if there ever was a marriage in the first place, which is doubtful--and abandonment. The last thing they need is a sanitized Bible that ignores the realities they deal with every day.

When I was nine or ten and going through hell in my own family, I was reading the Bible on my own (OT first!) and found a lot of strength and hope there. The Bible pulled no punches when it was discussing human behavior or God's response to it, and with the various stories (some horrific) I felt I was at least standing on solid ground, in touch with reality--however much it occasionally stinks.

When I had my own child, the only time I can remember skipping bits in the Bible during our family readings was when he was about three or so--and it wasn't such tame stuff as David and Bathsheba, it was the bits about that Levite's concubine being chopped up and mailed to various tribes in Israel. I was far more concerned about the dismembering stuff than the sex angles. And we added that passage back when he was about seven or so (with discussion, naturally). There is nothing off limits to him now, including the embarrassing stuff about guys hung like donkeys in Ezekiel--and if he had come across it on his own at a younger age (any age) I would have let him have it.

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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!

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