Where do you even start with the bible (old and new testaments)? Should I start going to church (catholic or protestant)?
It just seems to me that this isn't something you read cover to cover, I'm interested in studying it but reading it like that is boring as shit
learn biblical hebrew and koine greek first. full stop.
Anyway
How do you start studying the bible?
I read ot cover to cover, twice
Read the New Testament gospels. I recommend John. Then continue onto Acts and the Epistles.
For the old, at least read Genesis and Exodus for context. Proverbs and Ecclesiastes are actually good. Read the Psalms to see the continuity between old/new testaments.
You start with the sumerians and akkadians to fully understand how much has been stolen from other sources(the flood, moses's childhood) and understand what they mean by the amorites and why they use babylon as the archetypical city of wickidness.
i will never understand why plebs disregard understand BIBLICAL languages as necessities to understand the BIBLE
Or just learn Koine and read the Septuagint which predates the medieval hack of the J*wish MT by some 1500 years. Don't get memed into thinking the Masoretic interpretation is correct when the vowel marks didn't even exist before it.
Read the gospels, then the old testament, then the rest of the new testament.
Use a Catholic bible, but go to a Baptist church.
preliminary question, do you see yourself ready to join a monastery in the near future?
Fully yes, but most people(christians) included aren't ready for that kind of commitment(especially OP, since it's probably his first time reading it).
>the Septuagint which predates the medieval hack of the J*wish MT by some 1500 years
this is a common misconception
Commentators from the 1st and 2nd centuries said the Jews were already changing their texts to undermine the prophecies of Christ. MT made some of the chronology provably incorrect and has been made nonsensical.
Yeah bro, just trust the Israeli archaeologists who banned anyone else from viewing the Dead Sea Scrolls for almost 30 years, the fragments which vaguely support the Masoretic version are definitely dated older than the Septuagint ones.
lmao imagine being this naiive.
The Gospel of Matthew should be your first thing you read. It has the core teachings of Christ. From there it depends what you are interested in. Genesis, the Gospel of St. John and Revelation are especially important.
>actually being this retarded
there are no prophecies of jesus in the jewish scriptures. get over it christcuck
spitting truth.
christcucks barely even know their own religion
Start with John and then read Acts. Then read the other Gospels and Paul's letters.
The Old Testament was what Jesus and all early Christians used, so don't overlook it, but John and Acts are easiest to understand by themselves.
And try an modern English translation like NIV your first go
Actual copies of the NT and OT used during the first 2 centuries AD still exist. The King James translations are actually very accurate to those.
My father is a christian and he made me read the Bible when I was a child. Started out with Genesis. Only thing I could think of was "WTF do people believe this?"
avoid protcuck translations
unironically the beginning of pic related.
What was the moral of the story where Abraham tells Pharoah that his wife is his sister, Pharaoh wants to marry Abraham's wife, God giving Egypt plagues because of this, Pharoah finds out they're actually married, and then kicking them out of Egypt?
unironically. The KJV as an audiobook. Saves a ton of time.
honestly, cover to cover in chronological order really is best here. it's the ultimate grand narrative.
t. done it, recommend
fuck off idiot, why would he care about multiple pages of x begot y
because its not a *necessity* unless you're a self-interpreting heretic. the irony being that no protestant would ever bother to learn any of the original languages the holy scripture was written in.
you can obviously skim that; this doesn't preclude what I said.
I read it while in solitary confinement in prison.
It's the only book they allow. After a few weeks with no other stimuli, it gets a lot more interesting.
>if I go sit in a certain building or read a certain book, I'll become religious
JESUS CHRIST how fucking STUPID can you be
Uhm, actually, you're wrong. The book of Isaiah records the prophecy of John and the Christ's births, and this is well established, you just wish to know more about Christianity than Christians but aren't clever enough to actually achieve it. May the Lord have more mercy on you than I would.
samefag
Get the orthodox study Bible, it will have the best commentary. You can start form the New Testament if you want, or check for a Bible reading plan there is one where you read the hole book in 1 year 10-15pages a day.
Wrong
you are correct, religious conversion is a personal and emotional experience, you inform yourself of the details later
story?
you are correct OP about going to Church. self study of the text is a new innovation for most people, within the last 300 years. traditionally the only exposure the average person had to the bible was at a mass/service. the lectionary exists for a reason. I recommend trying out a few church services: sit in on a mass, go to an anglican or protestant service, try different branches, even try a quaker meeting if you're interested. hearing the text in a communal setting is essential.
there's a lot of different translations and ways to go about studying it. but start with hearing it out loud. the bible is meant to be heard, same as hymns are meant to be sung. any christian, myself included, can quote verses merely because I've heard them so many times out loud since my youth. if you're scared of going to a service, don't be. just sit in the back and observe. hope this helps