This group literally interpreted the Bible, at least when it suited them. They documented everything that they believed from the Bible. For quite a few years I was pretty confident that I knew the truth, or if I didn't know it right off, I could figure it out with enough Bible study. What I didn't know at the time was that these guys were pretty shitty Biblical researchers. They acted like they understood Hebrew, Greek and Aramaic, the Biblical languages, but, other than a tiny minority, knew just enough to transliterate the Greek & Hebrew characters and how to read definitions in a concordance. Even then they made unwarranted leaps of illogic and defined words in a way that would have surprised anyone who actually spoke those languages. Their understanding of English grammar, syntax and definitions was shoddy as well (they thought "research" meant to "search again"). It took me many years, but I finally figured out that their answers were bogus. But my big mistake wasn't that I was taken in by people who didn't properly interpret the Bible, but that I was taken in by the idea that the Bible was delivered in some fashion by God.
One of the "Big Ideas" to come out of the Protestant Reformation was sola scriptura or 'scripture alone'. This was the concept that what we know about God does not come from man's teaching, but from the pages of the Bible alone. This makes a certain kind of sense, it provides a written standard by which we can ascertain whether what we believe is true. We then are free from men's opinions about what is true. Or are we?
The early Christians saw the problem with this. By early, I mean the Christian Church as it existed from 200 A.D. and following. Back then there was no "The Bible". Sure, parts of what we now call The Bible were being written as early as 50 A.D.; other parts were written over 100 years later. But so were other books, letter, treatises, gospels and apocalypses that were treated by some Christians as equal or superior to what ended up being included in the Bible. Many of these writings, including (in my opinion) many that are now considered scripture, were written to either back up a particular point of view or debunk some other faction's point of view. And there were a lot of factions. As one faction gradually gained ascendancy, its leaders had to devise a way to promote and codify their own doctrine while casting the opposing views as heresy. This is where apostolic succession came about. It was assumed that Jesus transmitted truth to his apostles, who faithfully passed on the teachings to their followers who in turn accurately taught their followers. The unbroken line from one generation of leaders to the next was the guarantor of truth, not what was written. The leadership several generations removed from Jesus was deciding what Jesus said and what he meant and how it was to be applied. Far from being an inerrant "Word of God" it was a collection, at best, of what various men wrote about their experience of the divine; at worst it was a collection of factional pamphlets. Maybe it was inspired by God, but maybe not, there was really no way to know for sure.
So much for Truth.
The group that I had belonged to was of the opinion that you just had to read the Bible, and it would interpret itself (I'm oversimplifying). But what this group and so many others who believe that they have The Truth because they read the Bible fail to address is why, if just reading the Bible is all it takes, there are so many versions of The Truth. Well, some address it by claiming that these others aren't real Christians, or they're not actually reading the Bible, or demons are involved somehow. But what's really happening is that the Bible is so confusing and contradictory that it would be surprising if there weren't variant interpretations. People handle the contradictions in various ways. Some, who hold the view that the Bible is without error, will attempt to explain away every error, sometimes in ways that are reminiscent of pretzels. The Bible becomes literal, except when it's inconvenient, then it's metaphorical; irregular definitions are given prominence, and interpretations are shoehorned in to make them fit. But most people don't think this way; they actually don't think about the Bible all that much, except as something that they vaguely think of as the source of their vision of God.
While the fundamentalists and evangelicals and literalists are, as I was once upon a time, very concerned about Truth, the average Christian doesn't give Truth much thought. They "believe in God", they pray, they're pretty sure that they're going to Heaven when they die (although some people brag about going to Hell, because they're such rebel bad-asses), maybe tack on a few extras like going to church or "being a good person". They either don't know or don't care about things like the wrathful God of the Old Testament, and certainly don't want to hear about it, and might tell you "that's not the God that I worship". For the most part, their picture of God, Jesus, the afterlife, etc. is based on what they think it ought to be, not on any actual part of the Bible. For example, how many times have you heard a person refer to a deceased loved one as "looking down on them" or as their "guardian angel". Where do those concepts come from? Not the Bible. What about the gyrations people go through to explain how prayer works (or doesn't work)? People invent the God, the Jesus, the Heaven that they want, that fits into their worldview. People even get mad at God for allowing suffering, even though suffering is clearly part of our lot in life...according to the Bible. Most people make up their own religion; they just put familiar labels on it.
Not that there's anything wrong with that.
As long as you're not claiming that Christianity is The Truth when you're not even following any interpretation of the Biblical version of Christianity, but your own made-up version, and looking down your nose at non-Christians because you think that they are following man-made religion or philosophy, then I have no problem with you. What most people who gravitate to alternative religions, or to no religion, are doing, is thinking through what worldview works for them, whether that is Atheism, Buddhism, Humanism, Paganism or Pastafarianism, and making it their own. Most Christians are doing the same thing, only with a designer label on the home made hand bag.
There is no One True Path. If following a certain faith or philosophy makes you a better person, or helps you to make sense of the world, then that is your truth, and may or may not translate into a truth for someone else.
