The Useful Thinker

      Today I feel like taking a break from the series I have been doing on my changing view of the Bible and going into topics more in line with the Taoist spirituality I am living now. Reflection on where we've been is good, and hopefully my reflections will be helpful, but too much reflection makes one forget where they are currently. The most important thing we can be is in the present moment.     Since my awakening , I have discovered myself to be on a spiritual quest. The practice of spirituality that has made the most sense to me is Taoism. However, my awakening has freed me from being narrow-mindedly focused on just one way, as I was previously when I was a Fundamental Baptist. Now, I have the freedom to explore many different belief systems and spiritual practices.     It is always good to open yourself up and experience more than one view on things. One thing I would recommend, especially for young people, is that you travel to another c...

      In my previous blog post , I wrote about a well-known theory of how we got the first five books of the Bible, known as the Pentateuch. It was something I was aware of, even when I was still a Fundamental Christian, but did not really open my mind to. As someone who is supposed to be writing about Spirituality and Taoism, I hope that I have not lost you along the way. There's a reason I keep making excursions into Christian territory. This is my background, and as such, I am compelled to reinvestigate it with a higher mind. A secondary reason for my meanderings into old scripture manuscripts is because I think it may help someone else who may have also grown up in the church.     I want to address some objections that have been raised to the JEDP theory . Personally, I don't know how much of it I hold to. According to the late Dr. Alan Cairns 1 , a Free Presbyterian scholar, the idea that the Pentateuch (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deutero...