Is Psychology biblical?

I agree with Baptist Believer. Psychology is like any other science: based on theories, and constantly being changed upon new discoveries. The study of behavior and the way people think and the causes/treatment of behavior and "wrong" thinking is not ungodly. Embracing philosophies of self-satisfaction, or satisfying the flesh, are what are ungodly.

Discernment is needed.

 

Here is an excerpt from an excellant article. There will be a link at the end to the entire document...

Link....

http://www.psychoheresy-aware.org/endofcp.html

 

If we follow this line of thinking to its logical conclusion, and if you are consistent in your mindset, then you must believe that all pastors frame their teaching & doctrine in a way that protects their public-speaking produced income. There are more false-teachers that preach a watered-down gospel for profit than true teachers who preach the gospel to unbelievers without profit. Do you categorize all pastors & preachers into the same lump? If not, then why not? Your logic, when applied CONSISTENTLY, should condemn all for-profit pastors(those who take a salary), or does your doctrine make exceptions for those with whom you agree? :smilewinkgrin:

 

A straw man erected by ignorance taken from an extremely dangerously website. :BangHead:

 

Let me see if I can help you to understand. Medical doctors, and medical problems, are not the same issue as Psycotherapy. Medical doctors treat "flesh and blood" medical issues. Physical problems.

There is nothing in the scriptures that forbids that, and in addition, we actually see it being advocated in the scriptures.

Psycotherapy, on the other hand, is dealing the the thinking processes of the mind, the 'psyche" of a person, the inner thoughts and feelings of a person.

That...as you and others *should* know, is a completely different situation.

And it is a situation that Almighty God has the solutions for, and He has made it clear that He desires HIS CHILDREN (all of us christians) to seek HIS counsel, and appropiate His solutions to these issues.

NOT the "polluted cisterns" of the unGodly

The pertinant scriptures have been posted more than once on here.


THAT....is the differance.

AiC

 

Discerment I guess doesn't count with AiC. I'm a big proponet of Biblical counseling. Noting replaces the Word of God as being the answer. But, I'm not going to write off everything that modern psychology has to offer.

 

I believe it is. We are never commanded to love ourselves in the Bible. On the contrary, love of self is condemned. We are to love God first and our neighbor--we already love ourselves too much.

If I had put love for myself first, I certainly wouldn't have come to Japan as a missionary. Self love prevents sacrifice. We had a missionary with our board quit deputation for Japan recently, and every reason they gave spoke of love for self.

But go ahead. Tell me how you think love of self can be good.

 

Thankee kindly! :wavey:

 

Remembered this regarding love of self and thought It might be of interest.:love2:

"You are told to love your neighbour as yourself. How do you love yourself? When I look into my own mind, I find that I do not love myself by thinking myself a dear old chap or having affectionate feelings. I do not think that I love myself because I am particularly good, but just because I am myself and quite apart from my character. I might detest something which I have done. Nevertheless, I do not cease to love myself. In other words, that definite distinction that Christians make between hating sin and loving the sinner is one that you have been making in your own case since you were born. You dislike what you have done, but you don't cease to love yourself. You may even think that you ought to be hanged. You may even think that you ought to go to the Police and own up and be hanged. Love is not affectionate feeling, but a steady wish for the loved person's ultimate good as far as it can be obtained."

-C.S. Lewis, God in the Dock by C. S. Lewis

 

Amazing. Just amazing.

Discernment is*precisly* what what brought me to view this subject as I do, and it is discernment that I am advocating in all of my posts on this thread.

I am encouraging everyone to have the DISCERNMENT to to see and understand that christians should never turn from the counsel of our Great Father God, and seek the ridiculous counsel of unbelievers and secularists who in in some cases cases mock and ridicule the very existance of God.

People...open your eyes! Come to your senses.

Use some DISCERNMENT!!


AiC

 

This is not a bad statement. Lewis does not make the fundamental mistake here that many make of considering the statement, "Love your neighbor as yourself" to be a command to love yourself. It is not. The command (imperative) form in the Greek is to love your neighbor, so we are not commanded to love ourselves. The statement assumes we already do love ourselves.

In every case this statement occurs in the NT (Matt. 19:19, 22:39, Mark 12:31-33, Luke 10:27, Rom. 13:9, Gal. 5:14, James 2:8), the Greek for "as yourself" is wV seauton (os seauton) or the variation wV eauton (eaton). Thus, once again, there is no command in the Bible to love yourself, only an assumption that you already do.

 

If there are any who dont know, here is the great Sigmund Fraud's..I mean Freud's..view of religion...

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/questionofgod/twolives/freudbio.html


AiC

 

Only in your mind. I agree with Sag38, you need to learn discernment.

 

That is as I understood it as well! Greetings and prayers from L.A. also.:love2:

 

How foolish & immature of you to not understand that mental/emotional problems are often caused by physical problems. My wife has suffered from postpartum depression after the birth of our second child. A Christian psychologist diagnosed her & prescribed medications that brought her hormones back into balance. She was also sexually molested as a child which effected her on a deep emotional level. EVERY church leader that she talked to could only tell her to "pray & read the Bible more"; revealing their ignorance & shallowness in real-life counselling situations. Traumatic events in a person's life can can cause depression by effecting the chemical secretions that effect mood & personality.

Your opinion that all of psychology is anti-biblical & not "flesh & blood" medicine reveals your juvenile & fundamentalist understanding of the relationship between the body & the spirit. Perhaps you should gain a better understanding of the subject before you so openly expose your ignorance.

 

Concerning Sigman Freud, this was written...(bolding mine)

And we are supposed to help Christian men and women with problems...using the theories and ideas of this REPROBATE???

 

Comparing all psychologists to Freud is like lumping all medical doctors in with Josef Mengele. He made great leaps in our understanding of the human body thru his horrific experiments, but that does not demean modern medical doctors who use that understanding in treating their patients. As I said before, your extreme position cannot be held consistently, nor to its logical conclusions.

 

I am very very sorry to hear of the problems your wife has been having, and I sincerely hope she is doing better.

And it is very disappointing to hear that got such inadequate counsel from the pastors you mentioned. Very sorry to hear of that.

I just made a note of this and will pray for this situation.


However, in this thread I can not do anything other than share the truth regarding this issue. To do otherwise would be to turn my back on the truth, I can not do that.

Regarding the insults you directed towards me, its as if they never happened. Completly forgiven as far as I am concerned.

And brother, I am so far from being a fundamentalist that its ridiculous.

But you were upset, and you flared up a bit. I've been guilty of that before.

Its OK

God bless you and your family.


Mike

 

I'd like to suggest to you that oppostion to psychology is not a "fundamentalist undertanding," as you put it, but a position based on the historical-grammatical interpretation of the Bible common to all evangelicals.

Perhaps the leading opponent of secular psychology in the world of Christian counseling is Jay Adams, a Presbyterian and hardly a fundamentalist. He heads a large organization of Biblical counselors that avoid secular methods. Again, I have a book by evangelical Lutheran pastor Don Matzat that opposes self-esteem entitled Christ Esteem.

Once more, a non-fundamentalist Christian counselor named Charles Solomon has an effective method based on the Biblical doctrine of trichotomy. See his website at: http://www.solomonet.net/Welcome.html Some of his downloads may be a blessing and a help to you. While Solomon uses a strictly biblical method of counseling, he does admit that physical problems may cause emotional distress.