Time for reading list

I mentioned in a much earlier blog entry that I wondered if killing someone and being sentenced to life in prison would allow me to catch up on my reading. Well, that is, of course, nonsense. There is no way I could intentionally kill someone. But I do have another plan.

If I could, through a battery of tests or otherwise, convince the authorities that I mentally incompetent and should be committed to an institution I might then be able to catch up on my reading. Do they ever discharge you if you show signs later of mental competency? Might be tougher to continue the masquerade than to begin it.

Seriously, though, I really feel that I am cheating myself of so much by not having more time for reading. And my reading interest is ancient scriptural text. The writings that were considered for inclusion in our canon of scripture, whether included or not. Some of those not included tell us much about the peoples of the time in which they were written.

If you closely examine how some of the ancient text became canon it is really nothing short of divine that we have maintained and grown such a devote and large following of believers world wide. I believe it bears testimony to the life changing power that Christ brings to the world. Take away the entire Old Testament, leave out significant parts of the new, leave in the gospels, the actions of the apostles and some of the letters and you still have the central gospel message.

Much of Paul's letters are such a "thorn in the flesh" to many and fodder for the denominational and splinter groups' cannons that some of it could have been left out and we'd have less to fight about. So many forget the differential in time, customs, and societal norms in reading Paul's letters. They pull out his letters to use them as measuring devices to measure the ship of Zion. Sorry, the stadia rods of the first century are Greek to our modern society. No pun intended, of course.

I have discovered an extensive list of titles when researching analytical works concerning ancient texts. Of those, of course, one has to be selective and stay within one's own faith comfort zone. I am a Wesleyan because it fits best and I have strong leanings toward scientific explanations of temporal processes and leave the divine to the nontemporal. I believe that homo sapien sapien is the only dual entity in all of the universe, both divine and temporal. I believe there are beings and creatures that are wholly divine, some that are wholly temporal but only mankind is dual.

I am still reading Kugel's How to Read the Bible as I find the time. It will become a reference for me later I think as I explore other works concerning the ancient text. I expect to discover other viewpoints on many of the issues Kugel raises. And that is what makes all this interesting. Everything I know spiritually is becoming more clearly fluid than solid. And I believe that is closest to truth.