Revelation finished?

I've not done much study on this, but thought I'd ask anyway...

Basically the question centres on the writing of the Testaments, and such...

Is there any indication whether the writing is over, or whether we are to expect more in this area? (like a new Book of Matthew, Mark or Luke... but of another name)

I acknowledge there perhaps being a second coming of a 'messiah', but I just wonder whether maybe in a couple more thousand years the Bible will have any more chapters, or have a similar sister-book.

Also, was wondering if we are to expect more in terms of other religions. Does anyone have any idea?

I would assume that there may be newly found movements (not necessarily related) which would involve new literature...

Any thoughts on the topic?

Hey Black Gold

Yes there will be i heard Obama is going to add a few more chapters to the bible its gonna be named The book of Obama

Depends if anyone is on themselves enough to jot down random happenings, name the chapter of a red book with unbelievably thin pages (because the gideons are so stingy) after themselves, and then tell everyone that what they are saying is true!

In the early 80's, I read the Urantia book (http://www.urantia.org/detail.html). At the time, I was impressed by the quality of the writing, by the image/feel the book was attempting to portray. I mean, if I just had to believe in a God, at least the God as portrayed in the Urantia book is a lot more acceptable than the God as portrayed by many or most of his fanatic believers via their interpretation of the Bible. The Urantia book is billed as a follow-up to the Bible -- attempting to update and clarify the message, to fill in some blanks. Depending on where one is in his/her own exploration of this stuff, you may feel that the book accomplished its goal.

The book steers away from anything that might get it into real trouble -- such as specific predictions (that could be later disproved, invalidating the book), verifiable claims about historical occurrences, or apocalyptic attitudes. This wouldn't really qualify as an extension of Revelations, but it would qualify as a continuation of the "revelation" (the revealing) of God's plan to man.

Hmmm. God revealing himself to man. I wonder if that's why, on the 7th day, God was arrested?

it might be interesting to know that the Islamic religion, portraits Jesus C as a prophet preceding the famous "Mohamed".
as well as Moses, Noah and a few others, i think.

(not stating this as an answer to the question above, of course)

If we look deeply into history of religions, we find that most (excluding some) relate to the same happenings within the same region, some of them taking off after others, some of them "claiming" to be the continuation of others.

i see all of them as different interpretations or misinterpretations (either, don't really matter) of happenings relating to "men" and "women" in the past tense.

But i do think we should focus more on the teachings than the actual accuracy of the stories.

Each of them has a lot of values that save us a lot of suffering in terms of figuring out these values ourselves.

I doubt any religion is complete..


but again, I'm an atheist (of sorts)

Well, its true that the Islamic faith does claim that the quran is the next revelation after the bible, as islam teaches that all the old testament, and the new are from god, allah, whatever you want to call him, and the quran is just another, its in some way similar to the bible, but in MY opinion sweeter, why dont you read that, just to try it out.

sweeter ?

The Quran was written 600 years after the Bible. To me, it came across as a "Me, too!" religion -- as if a group of people felt left out of the Bible, and wanted to prove that God was on their side, too. So someone came up with "God's final answer!" -- the religion that is God's favorite, truer than any other religion.

Just another human claim to the REAL truth, the single truth that everyone else has been searching for.

Then again -- to be fair -- one devout Muslim told me that the English translation of the Quran has nowhere near the poetic depth and semantic nuance of the original Arabic. The profound beauty of God's expression can only be appreciated by those fluent in the language God chose to write the Quran in. If God thought English was good enough for him, he would have written the Quran in English.

Sigh. Psi.

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If God thought English was good enough for him, he would have written the Quran in English.

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huh ?


The reason why the Quran is never adapted in English is because some of it is still under interpretation, and some without any possible interpretations.

It is a book that claims to be the word of god revealed and memorized as is. (it's a very big book, it was memorized and kept written in pieces until eventually gathered into one book)

the poetry of the Quran is also claimed to be one of the reasons why it is "divine".

the book itself is considered a miracle of sorts in Islamic religion.

And any translator would tell u, that u can not translate something u don't fully understand, so the translation of the Quran is basically an issue of misinterpretation.

it is right tho, u can only truly appreciate it in Arabic, as most poetry would follow the same logic.

Even in Arabic, there's some of it that can be interpreted in different ways.

If God is a God for all people, then there is no language that is any better than any other. Why would God play favorites? Does he lack imagination? Heck, if it's a matter of nice-sounding language, I would prefer the God of the Urantia book. Suspiciously, most versions of God sound more like psychology than they do theology. Or, put another way, theology is psychology in disguise.

Yet another example of humans doing their best to make themselves feel special as a species -- and superior to other humans/belief systems. Another example of man trying to make sense out of the universe, using the limited set of tools at his disposal.

Humans have a virtually infinite capacity for self-delusion. "The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt." -- Bertrand Russell "Everything should be made as simple as possible. And no simpler." -- Albert Einstein

Yeah sweeter, but only because ive read the quran in arabic, and understood the language, i never had the fortune to do that with the bible. it is true that the arabic of the quran is non like anthing ive read anywhere else, its really beautiful, but it is unfair on people who will dont know arabic, and who don have the time, the will, or the oppurtunity to study arabic.. whethor god lacks imagination.. if there is a God, and he made us, and the world around us, i doubt very much he lacks imagination, but i dont follow Islam, I just thought as another religion preaches revelatoin from the same god, claims its own claim on the accounting of historical events and gives similar moral lessons, why not have a go at that one too. The english version isnt as nice, but unless you know arabic, its not like you could tell the difference.

A God that has the imagination to create an existence like the one we have, only to be stymied in his ability to communicate it equally effectively to ALL humans, doesn't make any sense. Did God create the Arabic language? Or did he just wait around for humans to create a language that God would use as the "perfect" language to communicate to humans through? If only those who are fluent in Arabic can "appreciate" the beauty of God's revelation, then isn't God telling us that we'd either better learn Arabic -- or risk losing out on one of the (allegedly) best proofs for God's existence?

Just doesn't make sense. Sounds more like psychology than theology.

quote:

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Humans have a virtually infinite capacity for self-delusion. "The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt." -- Bertrand Russell "Everything should be made as simple as possible. And no simpler." -- Albert Einstein

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It's intresting to see that most religions claim that God has spoken to them and them alone, without needing any proof what so ever.

But again, if we could not belief (as in admittance without proof), there would be no religions.

Religions are truly a magnificant display of the power of assumption.

or marketing in today's terms

Still, belief hasn't been yet admitted as "wrong" or simply inaccurate.

accuracy has no place in religion.

we most of the times lose our faith on meaningless misinterpretations of the original "facts" (or stories in other terms) and hardly ever lose our faith because of the teachings themselves.

i believe we should follow a set of teachings we find more helpful to us and others alike.

if we all had the same point of view, we would not need religion.

we need religion to help us share some common rules, but again goverments today do that job.
Then the power of religion has already diminished, even tho we end up needing it for certain things that goverments have no rule over, most of the time relates to our inner thoughts and intentions.

(the world religion used signifies any and all religions, even if each person has his own unique set of teachings on life thus it can also be called a religion)
but i think that's a bit off the subject of this post.

With regard to the opening post -- there are at least a couple books that claim to be God's efforts, working through His chosen emissaries, to expand upon what He has said previously, or to explain Himself to man: The Book of Mormon (1830). Quran (633). The Urantia Book (1955).

I think they're all interesting. Man keeps trying to explain to himself / rationalize / understand his relationship to the universe. God keeps trying to explain / reveal himself to man. Theology is psychology.

All this talk about God revealing himself to man. Is that why, on the 7th day, God was arrested?

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All this talk about God revealing himself to man. Is that why, on the 7th day, God was arrested?

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good one