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From: pmd@cbscc.UUCP (Paul Dubuc)
Newsgroups: net.origins
Subject: Re: Re. Bishop Ussher and the age of the earth,etc.
Message-ID: <5006@cbscc.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 18-Mar-85 21:59:54 EST
Article-I.D.: cbscc.5006
Posted: Mon Mar 18 21:59:54 1985
Date-Received: Tue, 19-Mar-85 07:53:22 EST
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Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories , Columbus
Lines: 31

Padraig,

Are you really a "seeker of knowledge", or do you just like to argue?  I took
you for the latter because of the tone of your posting (and others).  If you
just wanted the issue clarified, you could have been less sarcastic.  If I
have presumed too much about you, then I'm sorry.  I did not conveniently
omit your quote of Ken.  Any one following the discussion would have read it.

The point of my "presumptions about your speaking" is that if you speak of
the "sunrise" or "sunset" as such, you are using geocentric description.
Similarly, uses of words like "east", and "north", "right" and "left" are,
in a sense, flat earth descriptions.  "Is Spain really to the east?"  "Well
not really.  The earth curves slightly as you go, you see...".  The thing
I was trying to bring out, is that language does have rules of interpretation,
and I felt you were breaking them.  You didn't bother dealing with Ken's
question of how you would expect certain events in the Bible to be described
(e.g. the sun "standing still") and yet have the event be understood.

Scholars don't interpret the Bible as haphazardly as you infer.  Literary
criticism is a valuable discipline.  From the tone of your article I could
only surmize that you have quite a disdain for those who try to study the
Bible seriously and make sense out of what it says.  You seemed to be trying
to make nonsense out of it and that bothered me.  Again, I apologise to
everyone for my outburst.  It was totally uncalled for.

By the way, the reason I identified myself as "not DuBois" is that people
have gotten us awefully confused in the past, and I wouldn't want my inanity
to give the other "Paul" a bad name.  Thanks.
-- 

Paul Dubuc 	cbscc!pmd