Quote Originally Posted by admin
^
seriously jamie you should read more about roman history, there were schools, but for people who had a name. common folk as most everyone was in the bible would not be reading/writing. check out our literacy % today. If people can't read/write today w/ all of the technology how do you think they did over 2000 years ago

You should know better my friend. I do read. A lot as a matter of fact. And here is where I'm coming from and why:

You are absolutely correct, about the EARLY Roman Empire. In the early part of the Roman Empire there were no public schools. Most of the educating was left up to the parents in the home. They only taught their children crafts like farming, fighting, and labor intensive things for the boys, and weaving and sewing for the girls.

Now, in the later years (like 300 B.C if I remember correctly but don't quote me) when the Romans came into contact with the Greeks during the Macedonian Wars they got a different view of what "schools" were like from them. The Romans thought that like the Greeks, they should learn philosophy and liberal arts in order to be a better orator which was necessary in order to get the most coveted positions of working with the government (the Empire or the Senate). The wealthy hired Greek tutors to privately tutor their children. The not so wealthy were taught in "schools" by Greek slaves. They were taught how to read, write, and math along with philosophy and liberal arts. They also learned about astronomy, music, geometry, etc.

So commoners did in fact get to attend school, just not as good as the wealthy folks who had private tutorships. They still learned how to read and write. Since their "teachers" were Greek slaves, they also learned all this in Greek making them bilingual. Good students went on to "grammar" schools in their early teens. In those schools, they learned even more about Greek literature and also picked up Latin as yet a third language.

Now, with all that being taught, they also had Libraries to hold the books. Books were a very valuable possesion to the Romans, so in the wealthy homes they had slaves that would "copy" works and make them into books for their own private collections. By 400 A.D. , there were more than 30 libraries in Rome with the most important one being in Alexandria .

I highlighted certain things because again it connects the dots between what we've already discussed and how it makes total sense because of WHEN and WHERE things that have to do with the Bible and it being "written" occured.

1. Remember, the Old Testament was written in what??? GREEK. So it wouldn't be a far fetch since the Greeks were the ones that taught the people in that part of the world how to read and write.

2. Around the same time that Roman history says "libraries" were booming, ie. people were obviously literate enough to write books, was the time when the first parts of the Bible were WRITTEN down for the first time. Coincidence? Probably not.

3. As you notice, SLAVES were the transcriptionists of the past. So, how could it be that far fetched that Scholars could do the same work? How about not only doing it, but doing it better? And furthermore, those scholars that transcribed the works that make up the bible were far more educated and lived in a far more "civilized" world than the early Roman Empire. So again, how can it be so difficult to understand that if the works of people like Plato, Homer, and Virgil not only survived but are being taught in schools even today as part of ancient history....how come the Bible's validity and accuracy is questions, when we know was translated AFTER that?


By the way your looking way too deep into my statements... the CHURCH does tell you what they want you to read, if it was anything different you would be speaking latin and translating the bible yourself.
I don't follow that. How is the Church telling what to read, when they're merely telling you about it in your own language? It doesn't change the message just because you say it in a different language. The church didn't translate the Bible into a different language, scholars did remember. That's like saying that a teacher can manipulate what a BOOK says that was written before she even started to teach. She is not responsible for it's content anymore than a student is.

I lost you on that one bud.

I'm sorry who do you think translated the bible... we spoke earlier of the bible being made up of many books previously written on scrolls, tablets, etc... what do you think all that was put together by just some joe blow in bible. don't think so? since the fall of roman empire going into the middle ages the church had as much power as a king.
Again, you are partially correct. The church did in fact have vast powers in the Middle Ages and even beyond. I follow that. What I don't see is how you correlate that with scholars translating things from one language to the next? Are you saying that they were somehow influenced by the church's vast power into mincing words or manipulating a message? :confused: