What is this apocrypha parable saying?

I found this parable in the Bible Apocrypha and found it interesting to point out. It's in 2 Esdras.

Here we go:
He answered me and said "I went into a forest of trees of the plain, and they made a plan and said , 'Come, let us go and make war against the sea, so that it may recede before us and so that we may make for ourselves more forests.' In like manner the waves of the sea also made a plan and said, 'Come, let us go up and subdue the forest of the plain so that there also we may gain more territory for ourselves.' But the plan of the forest was in vain, for the fire came and consumed it; likewise also the plan of the waves of the sea was in vain, for the sand stood firm and blocked it. If now you were a judge between them, which would you undertake to justify, and which to condemn?"
I answered and said, "Each made a foolish plan, for the land has been assigned to the forest, and the locale of the sea a place to carry its waves."
He answered me and said, "You have judged rightly, but why have you not judged so in your own case? For as the land has been assigned to the forest and the sea to its waves,so also those who inhabit the earth can understand only what is on earth and he who is above the heavens can understand what is above the heavens can understand what is above the height of the heavens."

So is the parable telling us not to presume to know God's plans and know the limitations of what you may know? Or is it telling us to adopt a form of protective stupidity and not ask questions especially about cause and effect? It's also a bad comparison because God may know about the happenings of earth but we humans may not know the happenings of heaven.

Another interpretation I like is that neither side is prevailing in the end for it is all God's plan. In this case it's Babylon and Judea.

 

Jesus said-
"You hardly believe me when I tell you earthly things, so how would you believe me if I told you heavenly things?" (John 3:12)
which indicates our human minds can't see the big picture and shouldn't fret about it, but simply get on with our lives..

 

Yes. There are limits to any individual's knowledge and ability to grasp complexities. F.A. Hayek points out how useful a sophisticated theology is to a culture, a kind of collective data bank of both practical and abstract knowledge that provides a cultural binding necessary for long term survival, kind of like a computer data bank, in his The Fatal Conceit. The apocrypha are weaker than the 'canon' in usefulness, though, not as well written or internally consistent.

 

You do know that the apocrypha was an integral part of the Bible until a couple of English guys tossed it in 1881-1885?

 

Ya, I think 'mind ur business' is a good breakdown.

 

Not really, they were included in appendixes in many; some sects might have treated them as 'canon', but most didn't, and for good reason. Eastern Orthodox had differnt views as well.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_apocrypha


See also: Development of the Hebrew Bible canon and Development of the Old Testament canon
Jerome completed his version of the Bible, the Latin Vulgate, in 405. In the Middle Ages the Vulgate became the de facto standard version of the Bible in the West. The Vulgate manuscripts included prologues[12] that Jerome clearly identified certain books of the Vulgate Old Testament as apocryphal or non-canonical.

http://www.truthnet.org/Bible-Origins/6_The_Apocrypha_The_Septugint/


The Apocrypha

The word Apocrypha comes from the Greek word, meaning “hidden” or “concealed”. The term has several meanings, which are important to distinguish. The term generally refers to religious writings found in the Septuagint and Latin Vulgate, but not in the Hebrew Bible. The names for these writings can differ between Protestants and Catholics. The Catholics consider these writings as canonical, while Protestants do not, and Orthodox churches consider some as canon to a lesser extent then Catholics.


And an Evangelical theological view of them here. I don't refer to all non-Catholic sects as 'Protestant' sects, as the term doesn't quite fit most of them; I reserve the term for those sects that did revolt from Rome via The Reformation.

http://www.studytoanswer.net/rcc/rvb_apocrypha.html

 

You might benefit from some study. http://rockingodshouse.com/why-were-14-books-apocrypha-removed-from-the-bible-in-1881/

http://www.chick.com/reading/books/157/157_08a.asp Several pages.

BTW, the so-called Hebrew & Greek Bibles are just translations into those languages, They are not original sources.

 

Yes, that's why spiritual matters upset scientists, they were born with the gift of inquisitive minds and like to get everything neatly explained, but because the Great Mysteries of God can't be explained by them or anybody else, they pout and sulk and attack religion like immature spoilt brats..

 

It's obvious you're just trolling; you're not very good at it. Maybe stick to lying about what's in the Talmud is about the extent of your abilities.

 

I'll bet you couldn't produce a legitimate clearly legible copy of the Bible written in ancient Hebrew or Greek for anything. It's obvious that you don't know anything about the Bible. Now go chase some unicorns and satyrs.

 

To the back and forth above: Whatever you may believe about the Apocrypha, it's very existence makes me doubt that the Bible is the word of God. When some Christians put the Bible on a pedestal and say things like 'This is all I need' and 'This is the absolute truth', I want to punch them in the face for their dismissive attitude toward the Apocrypha.

You may give dozens of reasons why the Apocrypha should not be included in ANY Bible, but I'll tell you why it's very existence makes me not want to be a Christian:

1. In terms of literary quality, it's not of lesser value than the Bible. I loved reading the book of Sirach more than I did Proverbs.

2. The fact that the Christian world is divided on including the Apocrypha and the fact that those books were jumbled up with the 'cannon' books when sorting through the documents to form today's version of the Bible. So how do you discern what is the 'words of God'?

3. When most scholars say the Book of Judith is most likely fiction and then others say Noah's Ark, the splitting of the Red Sea and even Jesus are also fiction, why would the 'cannon' books hold more truth?

4. The Dead Sea Scrolls raises questions for BOTH the Bible and the Apocrypha.

 

I think the problem is that people are basically ignorant about the Bible's history. They simply don't know that the Apocrypha was an integral part of every Bible until 1881-1885 when two English guys decided to toss it into the trash can. The Protestants obeyed but the Catholics didn't and they kept the original Bible for the most part. It's only been deleted for about 135 years. That's very easy to verify because all that's necessary is to check vintage Bibles printed before that time. It's still possible to buy them but some are on the pricy side. Simply Google "antique Bibles".

Typical example: http://www.antiquebible.com/antique-king-james-family-bibles.html

 

I believe that the best way to answer your question is
to show you what near death experiencer former Atheist
Howard Storm was shown was happening in higher dimensions of
space time during the Holocaust of the Nazi era.

 

The more books that somebody takes somewhat seriously......
the less likely that person is to become either a literal or
philosophical terrorist of some sort.

 

The Apocrypha has some useful books. They are more secular than the other books and Wisdom and Sirach has some relevant information. There's a detective story as well as a dragon story. It also summarizes the Old Testament and illustrates why torture isn't effective against true believers. It was included in all Bibles until about 135 years ago.

 

As above, so below.

We should try to guess what the best (heavenly) laws should be, and apply them here on earth to create, as above, so below.

I think that that is what the ancients were doing and thinking before most mainstream religions became idol worshiping cults of Gods they say they cannot know or fathom.

http://bigthink.com/videos/what-is-god-2-2

I think the moral to your story is that we all have a niche in the world and we should be happy within it and that to try to move into someone else's niche is futile.

Regards
DL

 

Most people are confused about what is meant by 'Canon' re the Bible. It's merely a selection of the 'best'; many books are not included for a variety of reasons, mainly redundancy, uncertain provenance, or they are just passion literature. Some are rejected because they are patently false, or aren't up to doctrinal standards. Others are just total horseshit, like the Gnostic rubbish.

And nobody says you can't. It's just not part of the core books, is all. I like reading some of the Buddhist and Hindu English translations; should I run around claiming they're part of the Bible, too? Of course not.

It isn't all that divided on it, despite what some hope to sell.

If you don't understand literary devices like allegory, anthropomorphism, etc., then you'll always be confused. All of the 'books' in the accepted Canon are the core teachings. They were written with a purpose in mind, not just a bunch of 'verses' thrown out there for no reason and no relation to any other. The Book of Judith is most likely fiction; there are a number of reasons why it is thought to be.

Not really; they represent the writings of a sect, and the writings reflect that sect's views.

The 'Canon' was selected as it was because they were the most reliable and correct, and made up a solid core of teachings, that's all. Other books are fine, they just aren't as good as those selected for the canon, which is the core all Christian sects are supposed to use in common, whatever their other beliefs are.

 

lol talk about basic ignorance. They weren't 'integral parts', they were clearly distinguished as 'apocrypha' in the vast majority of sects' bibles, and in most they were an added Appendix. Quit lying to people on subjects you can't even Google Scholar competently.

 

Actually the standard canon is far superior to the other literature for the most part. too many lies and errors in the bulk of the rest.

 

FYI = https://www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/Apocrypha-Books/

 

How are you coming on those unicorns and satyrs?

 

I'm not going to address everything directly. What I will say is you say things like core teachings, reliable and correct that is merely a matter of opinion. So when the Christian scholars got together and went through all the ancient scrolls, they were selective for what they wanted their religion to teach and said 'oh here's a good one' and 'no this one's not acceptable'. And then arbitrarily they said 'God was speaking at this time and that but not at these other times'. So if something goes against what a church wants to teach, they can conveniently omit it and then say 'God was not speaking there'.

If I found a very compelling 'truth' in another religious text, I'm not saying it should be included in the Bible, but who could persuade me to ignore it and revere the Bible only? Also, I was born and raised Lutheran but if another Christian sect has some teachings that I think have some grains of truth, I'll embrace those that my church omits but not leave the church all together. Of course that is merely hypothetical as I don't consider myself Christian.

I find Protestantism a much better fit for me than Catholicism but Martin Luther was still an anti-semite. What I'm trying to illustrate here is that Church leaders are not always correct so maybe those who put together the Bible were not infallible either.

 

A lot better than you are at peddling easily disproved lies.

 

No, actually it isn't just mere 'opinion', it's long established by scholarship.

that isn't how it happened for the orthodox selections; you're just either letting the influence of outliers and small cults create the illusion of big giant alternatives being just as factual and reliable as any other, or you just want to bash Xianity because it makes you think you're more intelligent for doing so. The Orthodox core canon was selected because it was by far the most prevalent and based on the original Jewish and Xian theology.

Nobody says you have to. People don't buy Joel Osteen's books and sermons because he claims they are books of the Bible., after all. Nobody has tried to make them 'canon', not Osteen, anyway.

doesn't matter whether you are or not re the discussion. Maybe a college level course on history of the region during the rise of Christianity would help. An English translation of Joachim Jermia's Jerusalem in the Time of Jesus is an excellent historical text on Jewish culture, politics, and sociology. None of the stuff in the New Testament is just 'made up stuff by swindlers' 200 years later or any of the other nonsense made up by critics with agendas to peddle.

Individuals don't have to be 'correct', the theology itself 'self-corrects' the errors and mistakes of humans; and once one realizes the books in the core canon are written to operate on many levels of thought, then one can get past those who think 'Biblical literalism' is just about the lowest levels of writing and move on. As for there being different sects and types of ministries, that's to be expected because of the variety of human needs. I haven't run across any real 'errors' in the New Testament books as far as theological consistency goes, in any case; ho anachronisms, no evidence they were just making it all up, which is a truly stupid claim given how much violence was directed at Christians, as if that would make lots o bucks for con men or something, but whatever.

 

I think it means don't ask too many questions about the all pervasive god's intent or motivation behind all this crap called life because it can't be understood by us mere hoomans (which means I don't know any better'n you, y'all). It is the ultimate dogmatic out of all religions.