Yeah, I'm similiarly working through my worldview, which at the moment involves exploring a Bible that is true but need not be literally true. One nice resource is http://thetorah.com, which are essays by orthodox (and Orthodox) academic Jews discussing Judaism and biblical interpretation in light of current historical understanding. They are solid academics and faithful Jews, so it is a good example of the synthesis.

> Yet there were contemporary Roman historians who had a rather modern idea of what history was supposed to do.

I'm not sure that is true, although I haven't read any Roman historians. My understanding is that ancient histories were written to fit a theme. I think that Gospels are pretty factual, but in the introduction to Luke the author specifically states his purpose: "that you may know the certainty of the things you were taught" (Luke 1:4). Presumably accurate facts are indispensable to this end, but the point is not "this are the events of Jesus and possibly how socio-political events shaped them" like a modern history of, say, Rome or Venice would be. I think Polybius and Josephus are regarded as fairly accurate, but I think Polybius was trying to figure out why the Romans were successful, and Josephus had an agenda of making Romans (or certain Romans) look good. But I think Tacitus simply made up German-barbarian characteristics without even ever travelling to Germany, since his goal was to comment on Rome's decadence. [1] Although my point was more towards the Old Testament, which was written/edited/collated five hundred years earlier and modern detached analytical objectivity-as-far-as-possible was not their goal.

> [Adam, Romans 5]

Personally, I've never thought Paul's argument made any sense even with a historical Adam... I've never thought that the Catholic argument for original sin, being transmitted through Adam made any sense, either. I thought I've read somewhere that Paul saw Adam as representational, but I have no idea how I'd find that. Certainly Paul is happy to symbolize: in Gal 4:24 he says that we can take Hagar and Sarah symbolically, representing two different convenants. If Gen 1 is of the myth genre, then Adam representing humanity makes sense. It's always been my view that regardless of the existence of Adam, each of us has made the same choice and willfully sinned, so in that sense each of as is Adam, and Gen1-Adam "represents" each of us. (I'm not sure that's an orthodox argument, though) I guess I don't see Paul being wrong about events before recorded history as a problem, though. He's making a point about who Jesus is, not an archaeological assessment, although his archaeology reflects the Jewish consensus of his day.

> C.S. Lewis

I've always thought C.S. Lewis had a high view of the Bible, so I curious where you felt he didn't take it seriously. Was it from _Mere Christianity_ where he more or less says that Gen 1 - 11 is of the myth genre? He was a literature professor, so it seems like he's likely to have a quality opinion.

> atheists aren't rebelling against God any more than a Christian is rebelling against Thor

I think Lewis would disagree with you. Lewis was Anglican, so if NT Wright is representational of (orthodox) Anglican thought, God created a temple on earth (the garden, can't remember why this is a temple) where the image of the deity is humanity. We were to be co-creators and be his partners in finishing creation, but we rebelled. Christ fixed that problem, so the co-creation project is back on track. Atheists, by definition, are not co-creating with God, they are doing their independent thing. Elsewhere I think Lewis sees independence as essentially rebellion; imagine if, say, the southern States decided to ignore the government in Washington. Last time that happened, the government considered it rebellion.

(This gets complicated, though, since I don't think American Christians are on board either. And I expect that some non-Christians are acting more onboard than some Christians. I'm not convinced that simply "praying the prayer" gets you into heaven, but Jesus said we don't have the information to judge someone's salvation, only the fruit that we see. But given that Jesus expects to say to some people doing miracles for him "depart, I never knew you", I think that if there is a Last Judgment, a lot of people are going to be in for a surprise, in both directions. Kind of like the Calormene guy in Lewis' _The Last Battle_)

> Buddhism, Taoism

I have read some about both. A friend gave me a great book _Why you are NOT a Buddhist_, which is really clear. The author had really good insights about American (Western?) culture, too, some of the best I've seen. I think he wrote it to disabuse Americans who consider themselves Buddhist because they slap some meditation into their lives. As I understand Buddhism, it's essentially that life is pain and we can escape into nirvana-nothingness (except nirvana is beyond concepts) by realizing that everything is impermanent and detaching from our desires. (I'm sure this is a gross simplication) I think Buddhism is a rational choice if there is no possibility of our desires being fulfilled. But if Christ has reconciled all things, death is vanquished, earth will be recreated/restored, evil will be banished, I'll take that route if it's viable. Besides, I'm not convinced that we can really get rid of our deep desires; and if they are there because God put them there, we won't be able to.

I'm not really sure what Taoism says, beyond life is ambiguous and you need to flow with the inherent tensions (if that is even right). The book _Taoism_ by Holmes Welch is a brilliant analysis of Lao Zi's work, and goes into several levels of interpretation, which are insightful, and end up concluding that one of Lao Zi's goals was the instruction of a method of mystical experiences. Unfortunately I have completely forgotten all the details. It didn't seem relevant, though.

Obviously Christianity has no monopoly on insight into human nature and how to live. But as far as I can tell, Buddhism is escape-from-the-world, but I'd rather co-create with God. To be fair, American Evangelicals are largely escape-from-the-world as well. Anyway, my original argument was for the truth of Christianity, and I think it offers more truth about human nature than Buddhism. It certainly offers a better future, if it's true.

[1] https://acoup.blog/2020/02/07/collections-the-fremen-mirage-...