I caught an article on another site that simply forced my hand in this regard. A guy who runs a site called Friendly Atheist wrote an article entitled “Why I’m Not an Angry Atheist”. In it, he attempts to explain, as the title says, why he’s not an angry atheist, apparently equating passion with anger. Such as here:
But if your religious beliefs (illogical as they may be) are doing something positive for our community and our world, and in the process, you’re not trying to stop scientific progress, impede promising research, hurt my gay friends, control another woman’s body, force your beliefs upon anyone else, ask the government to give you special privileges, or make me fear coming out as an atheist in public, why should I be attacking you?
Look, I’m a humanist as much as I am anything else. I want what’s best for people. And yes, on the surface, it’s difficult to explain why on earth someone would still be against religion if people are willing to be “moderate” about them and still accept scientific research and civil liberties. It sounds like the person simply has a vendetta and it’s more about personal grudges than societal progress.
The problem here is twofold. In the first case, we have to realize that nowhere in the Bible/Torah/Koran does it say that it’s okay to be gay or have an abortion. Everything in his list is, according to the various holy books, exactly what a believer in said religions should do. The bible says birth begins at conception, homosexuality is wrong, and anyone who worships false gods should be punished for it. Among other things. If one claims to be a Christian or a Muslim and does not do what the “Friendly Atheist” lists, then that believer is allowing sin to occur.
I often read and hear from people who start to say things like “well that’s not meant literally” or “as long as you do good, you’ll be fine.” In both cases there is nothing in the actual holy books to support that. The bible doesn’t come with a color code to signify what’s literal and what isn’t, and Jesus may be the redeemer but he didn’t disregard all sins in a blanket sweep. So what we have here is the unavoidable conclusion that religious “moderates” are letting people commit mortal sins damning their souls to hell and they have no problem with that.
The next time you talk to, for example, a Christian moderate, ask him if Jews can go to heaven. Make him answer.
Problem two is one that Dawkins and others have touched upon: the “floodgates” thought. Religious moderation, ignoring how misguided and bizarre it seems to me, still accepts religious belief and leaves room for fundamentalists. As long as we, as a society, accept the holy books as part of our culture in a true and real sense and the gods in them are real, then we are tacitly allowing people to take them literally (after all, read above) and giving them free reign to go crazy.
Fundamentalism cannot exist if we eliminate all religion, and to expect it to go away while moderate religiosity remains is a foolish endeavor indeed. We live in a society where it is considered admirable to watch documentaries of the believers who flog themselves, crucify themselves, whip and lacerate themselves in grand parades to show the depth and devotion of their beliefs, as opposed to scoffing at the insanity of beating yourself with chains to prove you really, really love the man in the sky. We, even many liberals I’m afraid to say, offer quiet admiration for those who act on such unwavering faith, and this is dangerous thinking.
And then we get into the intellectual conundrum. Too many people focus on whether “religion” is good or bad. Religious people do great things, they do terrible things. For every charity, there’s a violent militant group. But that’s missing the point. The point is that their beliefs are based on falsehoods, and maybe this is where I separate from many of my atheist brothers but I value truth over whether or not it’s good to believe the lie.
Religion is the only aspect, the ONLY aspect, of knowledge in which disagreements over facts is accepted. In history, we’re not allowed to disagree about who Socrates was or how he died. We can’t say that Christopher Columbus may not have actually sailed to America. Mathematicians can’t argue over how many the number 10 signifies, or whether or not the area of a triangle is one half its base multiplied by its height. Physicists don’t get to say that objects in a vacuum really do fall at different speeds.
Now this isn’t entirely true. Disagreements are accepted, but only when they can be proven and then the theory that is proven true is considered the new “fact”.
However, in the case of religion, we simply accept the differing viewpoints. You believe Jesus was the messiah? Grand. You believe he didn’t exist? That’s fine. You think Noah truly built an Ark with all the species on it and lived to be 950? Fantastic. You think it’s a folk tale? Wonderful. You believe Mohammad was truly inspired by an angel to write the Koran? Lovely. You don’t believe he was a real man? More power to ya. In religion only is “truth” seemingly disregarded and replaced with “respect”.
Furthermore, religion is, as many of my more extreme brethren have described, a conversation-stopper. We have a society that does not pursue interrogation when it comes to religious beliefs. An example I’ve seen is that of the conscientious objector in wartime. If you’re religious, it’s easy. If you’re a decorated moral philosopher, it’s much harder. When someone tells you that a belief of theirs is based upon their religion, our culture has decided that you can’t press on. “God” terminates all discussion.
If I say the flat tax favors the wealthy, you can insist that I support my opinion with statistics and economical evidence. If I say that the PATRIOT Act is invasive and not necessary to fight terrorism, I would not only have to explain how it’s invasive but also demonstrate how terrorism can be fought without it. But if I say homosexuality is wrong because God says so, then that’s the end of it, I don’t need to provide any more support.
To this end, while it’s true that “moderate believers” allow more freedom than “fundamentalists”, it does not stop the moderates from still acting irrationally because that same acceptance is given. When a doctor refused to see a patient because the mother was tattooed, his beliefs were his reason and as such the standard dealing with the issue was not accepted. Had it been some old guy who disliked tattoos, he would have been duly criticized and lambasted for idiocy.
Consider abortion or any other issue (stem cell research, gay marriage). Taking the stance of scientists, be they social or medical, we can have a debate between both sides to argue their beliefs. When does life begin? What kind of an effect would gay marriage truly have on society? These can be discussed rationally, with real points to be made, and perhaps one side may yield and acknowledge being wrong, and in the end the conclusion will, optimally, be one reached by rational discourse.
Not so if one side bases its beliefs on religion. When that happens, the debate is over. What rebuttal is there to “God says so”? In a debate, if one side says he believes what he does because that’s what God decreed, the other side can’t argue that maybe God is wrong or that God is not a reliable source of information (or that he’s not there at all), because that, as above, is not “respecting” religious beliefs. When that happens, all you can do is cross your fingers and hope that someone else, preferably someone in power, has different beliefs because you sure can’t do anything to change your god-worshiping opponent.
Moderate religion is intellectually dishonest and leaves the door open for suicide bombers and fundamentalist nutjobs. Simple as that.
Do I stand on street corners and yell about the evils of religion? Of course not. Do I antagonize the religious at every turn and make it a war against them? Not at all. However, do I accommodate those who cling to religious dogma even if they claim to be a “moderate”? No. I do not and will not.
“Friendly” atheism is an atheism that allows and accepts theism not because it’s what is right, but because it’s what’s easy. It’s easy to say “well I don’t believe in God but I don’t have a problem with it.” It’s easy to say “well Jesus was a great guy, I just don’t think he was the son of God.” Unfortunately, that ignores the core problems that religion presents to society. Soft and flaccid atheism will inspire no change.
I am “friendly” in that I present my beliefs rationally, without antagonizing, and in a calm and civil manner. That is all the friendlier atheists need to be.
A couple of years ago I would have agreed with you. Not so much any more.
One of the biggest problems with the article is that it presumes that you know more about the beliefs that, say, Christians espouse, than do practicing Christians. And that it lumps together hugely disjointed and widely varying sets of beliefs from all kinds of different cultures (say, the Islam practiced by an upper-middle class American family to that of a jihadist). It holds the One True interpretation of All Religion, and judges it to be Wrong in the face of the Truth of Atheism. Pardon me for being skeptical of an author’s omniscience.
See, it’s actually the moderate Christians and the moderate Muslims and the moderate Jews, etc., etc., and the moderate atheists who will get along. Why? We don’t have the kind of dogmatic rigidity and unwillingness to accept heterodoxy that characterizes extremism. We’re not trying to remake the world in our own image. That’s the real problem with fundamentalism.
“Moderate religion is intellectually dishonest and leaves the door open for suicide bombers and fundamentalist nutjobs. Simple as that.”
I get what you are trying to say here, but you should have explained that for fundamentalist and suicide bombers to operate there has to be a form of social polarization from the moderates. They have to relate the same belief system to of the fundamentalist in order to make the fundementalist/sucide bombers legitimate in the eyes of society. To say they do what they do solely because moderates allow it is false. What you mean to say is by acknowledging the same basic belief set as fundamentalist they are allowing the “nut jobs” enough social legitimacy to carry out their agendas. So although the moderates are not directly responsible for the actions of the fundamentalist, they are responsible for the justification of them. It is like the political parties….left –dems, middle – mods, and right-conserves…but in the case of religion it is left – atheist, middle- moderates, and right- fundamentalist. The same argument can be turned around to show that moderates legitimize atheist as well as fundamentalist.
I have a question for Josh.
I was quite curious about how you achieved your views about religion. The wishy-washy version of religion does not sound like any religion I have ever heard of before.
The sad fact is, religion is not peaceful. The belief system you’re following has no base theologically. Your very own Bible commands you to do unthinkable atrocities to people for petty crimes.
History will show you that religion is the most destructive thing humans ever created. Christianity alone has countless stains in its history; Holy Wars, Crusades, genocides, the Inquisition, ECT. I hate to say it but Pope Gregory IX (started the Inquisition) read Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. Every inquisitor who ordered the torturing of tens of thousands of people had read and studied the entire Bible thoroughly. As did the priests of the Puritans during the Salem Witch trials. Evidently, every single one was able to justify their actions based on scripture, often their actions were fueled by scripture.
If this is the case, I wonder what religion you follow. For every rational person today has to condemn such evil actions, yet the fundamentals of Christianity support and encourage those actions.
~Qualifying Creative Quality~
O how I wish there was a real good God
Helping us survive Earths bacterial sod
Ministering to all through sweet dreams
With an encouraging morality that gleams
Supplying a mortal frame that will not rot
Having hemoglobin that will not brain clot
Bones that bend rather than break in a fall
A body that can endure any reality all in all
This God won’t condone bacteria’s & viruses
He would be with us through any bad crises
The great God would not allow religious wars
He will not accept humans dying by the scores
Crime and corruption is not his mental making
Persons would be real in heart without faking
A real God needs not churches, clergy & prayer
If he did it right, we would treat each other fair
Using truth, beauty, goodness and loving service
A visible God can keep folks from being nervous
He must have a working universe administration
To detour big Meteorites from Earths devastation
His celestial workers could regulate the Suns heat
And stop the worlds wobble, keeping the orbit neat
I’m just a puny fragile skin & bones evolving mortal
And have the commonsense in seeing a better portal
Boiling reality down to a usable tangible conception
We’re that freewill choice person called God in action
Reality goes at the speed of choice, that be understood
Quality thoughts will evolve this world into the good
Shit I wish there was a really good God from everyone
Helping each other survive by tilling Earths sod for fun
We could actualize our sweet dreams through ministry
Our moral code would express a higher creative dynasty
Happiness and contentment would exemplify good health
Religions no longer create the poor, we would have wealth
Fear gossips, deity myths, and stupid superstition expelled
We Earthlings can enjoy life from good thoughts propelled
Want bliss? Think about this
Keith…
“One of the biggest problems with the article is that it presumes that you know more about the beliefs that, say, Christians espouse, than do practicing Christians. And that it lumps together hugely disjointed and widely varying sets of beliefs from all kinds of different cultures (say, the Islam practiced by an upper-middle class American family to that of a jihadist). It holds the One True interpretation of All Religion, and judges it to be Wrong in the face of the Truth of Atheism. Pardon me for being skeptical of an author’s omniscience.”
I hate to say it, but I frequently find that I know more of the Bible than the Christians I argue with. I’m no expert on the Koran, but then I hardly talk to Muslims as I don’t live in an area with too many of them (though I’m doing my best to wade through when I have the free time).
Interpretations are the problem, because an interpretation is inherently a superimposition of one’s personal beliefs onto something in order to glean that which one wants out of it. There is nothing in the books that leads to these interpretations, they don’t offer any basis upon which to say Chapter X of Book Y is literal but Chapter W of Book Z is open to interpretation.
As society plods along, more and more of the books are up for “interpretation”, which to me simply means society realizes that more and more of the Bible is false, but is still too afraid to simply discard it. I’m hoping to boost the process along.
Bad news 1
Hanlon: I think you’ve written a terrific little screed, but I have to press the point when you say that the only way agnosticism is justified is for us to be agnostic about Santa Claus and polytheism, too. The fact is, we *should* all be agnostic about Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, the Great G’Zoo, Zeus, and so on; we *should* all be agnostic about the objective existence of physical reality, for that matter. All that I know without any doubt whatsoever are my own mental phenomena–my own thoughts and feelings and sensations and memories and so on (although I cannot know that my memories *are* memories–remember Arnold Schwarzenegger’s character in Total Recall, and realize that it is a fundamental assumption that those mental phenomena that feel like copies really are indicative of other mental phenomena’s having been experienced “at a previous time”–or that I “have mental phenomena” rather than “mentally phenomenalize”). That there are objectively real tables and chairs and oak trees corresponding to certain of my mental phenomena is a basic metaphysical assumption I make, together with the basic epistemic assumption that I can gain reasonably reliable information about that objective reality via my senses; and that other people have mental lives is another basic metaphysical assumption, along with the basic epistemic assumption that we can gain reasonably reliable information about each other’s mental states via observation of behavior and via speech. Once we have those basic assumptions, we can get the whole collective enterprise of science off the ground. But accepting the objective reality of tables and chairs and oak trees is an *assumption* I make, and ultimately, there is a certain degree of uncertainty about the matter. So, I must remain agnostic about the existence of physical reality–even though I don’t believe, even a little bit, that physical reality *doesn’t* exist.
Similarly, I am agnostic about the existence of God, but that doesn’t mean that the question of God’s existence is a fifty-fifty matter, or that I believe *even a little tiny bit* in God’s existence. My agnosticism is *skepticism*; it is the withholding of belief. If I ever say, “There is no God,” I mean it just the same way I would mean, “There is no Santa Claus.” Yes, it’s conceivable that Santa Claus really exists–we can always tell a story about an effectively bottomless bag full of toys reaching into a fourth spatial dimension and an anti-gravity device that enables Santa’s reindeer to fly and an invisibility cloak that keeps Santa’s home from being seen and a matter transmitter that enables Santa to get into houses and a time-freezing machine that lets Santa get to all of the houses in the world in one night, and so on, to maintain the logical possibility of Santa’s existence–but *conceivability is not reason for belief*, and I don’t believe in Santa, not even a little tiny bit. Similarly, it’s conceivable that a God of some sort exists–but there’s no good reason for me to believe it that I can see, so I don’t believe in God, not even a little tiny bit. Nevertheless, this is a form of agnosticism, at least with respect to *certainty*.
I completely agree with self-professed atheists who say, “There is no God,” and mean that it is unreasonable to believe that there is a God, but who concede the logical possibility of God’s existence. Unfortunately, I think that the term “atheist” invites the “You have faith, too!” line from theists, so I simply call myself a “nontheist” now.
Nil Desperandum
[...] You Sound Like What You Hate From a post by someone explaining why he isn’t a “friendly” atheist. Fundamentalism cannot [...]
I agree with you , Hanlon, that dogma is the core problem. I too am interested in the truth, but, the way I see it, most people want hope, protection, freedom from feeling powerless, freedom form death and peace of mind much more than truth. No atheist-humanist worldview, I know of, can provide that.
So, until science makes us (allmost) immortal and pain-free, some form of religion will stay. I think we should focus the effort in pushing for critical thinking and science, and convince all religions to agree with the Dalai Lama that said: “If science proves our beliefs wrong, we change them.”
So we get rid of dogma, yet allow people hope for afterlife, divine justice, and all.
Good site! I found in google.com +
Hanlon: your comment system is losing comments. May be length related.
Cenobite: I suggest you read the Yoga Sutra of Patanjali. You’ll note that it’s structured as a series of *experiments* that one performs with one’s mind. The format is “try this mental experiment, observe your results. If you observe X, Y and Z you have seen [philosophical construct.]”
It’s not science, but it’s an experimentalist approach to finding truth.
Josh. Sorry, this is going to hurt.
JOSH QUOTE:
“Note that this is entirely different from Christianity. Christianity is, as far as evidence goes, a lousy religion: a book that’s been hacked back and forth for two thousand years, probably wasn’t written until 50 years after the principle was crucified, little or no historical supporting data etc. It’s a cold case.”
QUOTE ENDS
Outside of the Bible, we have *NO HISTORICAL PROOF THAT JESUS CHRIST EVER LIVED*. No tax records, no statues, no monuments, no beyond-doubt reports. Furthermore, we have no eyewitness testimony recorded at the time – we have fragmentary testimony of only a handful of people, recorded at best 50 years after the fact, according to my last researches.
Then we have the Council of Nicea and similar events, plus translations which were often politically motivated.
You look in your Bible. The red bits – the direct speech of Jesus – how much of that is there?
The *entire koran* is red text. Not a single line translated, not a single word lost, for 1400 years, all preserved from the moment it was uttered, more or less. Then you look at the tens of thousands of pages of historical documentation of the life of Muhammad.
You *can* know Muhammad the historical man: he’s there, day by day, blow by blow. This cannot be said for the historical Christ: we have hearsay, and nothing more.
CONTINUED
JOSH QUOTE BEGINS:
Some of it was written by people who were eyewitnesses to the events described, and most definitely not 80 years later.
QUOTE ENDS
Josh, could you show me exactly which texts were written *at the time that Christ lived*? As far as I can tell, the texts of the Apostles were passed down orally and written down long after the Crucifiction – like 50 years of oral transmission before being written. Can you link to your sources?
JOSH QUOTE BEGINS:
Your claims for Islam of (quote) “enormous political changes and a body “*enormous* political changes based on the activity of this one individual, plus a body of belief which lasts into the present with *extermely* strong lineage to those original events” hold equally true for Christianity! And you provide no further information to back up your claim that the whole debate “stems from epistemological problems with the English language and the awful shadow of Christianity
QUOTE ENDS
Nope. There is *NO POLITICAL LINEAGE* between the rulers of Rome and Christ – nothing. At all. A body of ideas passes, but it’s not like the Caliphate being passed down from person to person from its founding King.
Really, trust me on this: of the Abrahamic traditions, Islam is the only one with any meaningful historical documentation of What Actually Happened. And however much you might dislike them, it’s not unfair to suggest that they’re a better example to study that Christianity because of the level of documentation we have of What Actually Happened.
CONTINUED (god this is annoying)
JOSH QUOTE BEGINS:
However, I will concur that “undereducated bible thumping fundamentalists” are a problem, but the problem there lies with the *uneducated* part, not the Bible or fundamentalists. Your claim that Christianity is somehow “incompatible with scientific approaches to knowing truth” is only because you have the wrong understanding of Christianity.
QUOTE ENDS
I’ll grant you that all – ALL – of the initial founders of the Scientific Method were Christians, albeit frequently of a Rosicrucian mold.
But Christianity requires no learning, only faith. In this respect it is incompatible with Science in a profound way, as are all of the Monotheisms except, possibly, Judaism.
Hindus have the path of Jnana – of knowledge of what is real – open to them if they are of a scholastic bent. In that domain, there is no “salvation” – people are already saved, by virtue of never having been separated from god – there’s simply discovery of what is true already, and consequent relaxation. The knowledge of still being connected to the consciousness of everything which has consciousness is reacquired, although the connection itself was never lost, if that makes sense.
Sorry to be harshin’ on the Christianity, man, but the historical facts are the historical facts: we have almost no documentation that Christ ever lived outside of the books written by those invested in the story. Muhammad, we can know about as a historical figure.
Vinay, I’m trying to figure out where your comments are going. It does seem like my filter is stealing them though I can’t for the life of me figure out why. Length seems a likely candidate.
I’ll check periodically for the comments and then restore what I can. At the moment it would just lead to repetition as they seem to be the same as what made it through.
I’d like to also add that a historical Muhammad seems, at least to me, a near certainty. One can obviously say that Allah is no more real than Yahweh and that the religion as a whole is a simple adaptation of Judaism with a far more violent bend, but that a man named Muhammad lived and wrote the Koran is very difficult to argue with. At least from what I’ve seen, my familiarity with Islam is limited.
I have spent the past 20 years serving my country as an Intelligence Officer in branch of the military. Throughout these past 20 years I have been repeatedly asked what the biggest threat facing our country is. I have always answered with a single word – religion. Religion breeds ignorance and ignorance produces suicide bombers. Greed is probably the second biggest threat as that is what has historically driven armies against each other. But in modern times it is surely religion. Nations led by people believing in “higher powers” are bound to do stupid things thinking THEIR GOD will protect them (in some cases even asked them to do it).
As human beings we must all accept the facts – no gods. We live – we die and somewhere in-between we take time to enjoy life and hopefully help advance human knowledge.
Your article was a delightful read. Unfortunately it will be virtually impossible to deprogram generations of humans who have proven incapable of thinking for themselves. I will do my part by ensuring that my children have the ability to apply logic and arrive at intelligent conclusions based on fact and not the fables of 1st and 2nd century tribesmen.
A concerned atheist in a foxhole…
Hi guys,
Phew, this is quite the crazy debate. Here I go again.
Response to Sam
===============
You ask how I achieved my views on religion. Through lots and lots of study. I find it interesting that you have interpreted what I say as “wishy-washy”. On the contrary, I find what I believe intensely challenging and quite firm. I don’t say that it’s fine to do whatever you want, which you seem to be suggesting. I am saying that we are called to evangelise non-Christians (tell them about Jesus), not tell them what behaviours they should or should not be doing.
It is patently false that what I believe has no theological base. Have you read the Bible analytically and critically? What atrocities am I commanded to commit? Jesus tells us to love God and love our neighbours, and he goes on to clarify that neighbours means anyone we come into contact with. If you are talking about the Jewish law, it is not what non-Jewish Christians are commanded to do. If you provide me with evidence why I should commit these atrocities, I’ll respond.
Your statement that “religion is the most destructive thing humans ever created” is quite simply false, if we are talking here about human death. The Ottoman Empire, Hitler, Stalin, the Cultural Revolution, Pol Pot, etc, have caused an order of magnitude more destruction and death than all religion down through the ages. If it is not just death and suffering you are talking about, please clarify a bit more what you mean. And just reading the Bible doesn’t mean you are doing what it says! (As in the case of Pope Gregory IX)
Of course Christianity has stains in its history, because any human institution, over time, will seek it’s own benefits over anything else. Governments, corporations, non-profits, etc. Religious *institutions* are not exempt from this.
You say that the fundamentals of Christianity support these actions. Again, rubbish. Have a read of the Nicean Creed, you can read it here: http://www.creeds.net/ancient/nicene.htm
It came out of the need to have a short statement of the critical things Christians believe. My opinion is that who believes it is a Christian. Where do the atrocities come in there?
Please provide some more detail, and I will be happy to respond.
Response to Vishay Gupta
========================
Don’t worry about hurting me, I’ve gone through many years and dozens of books to verify what I believe.
First of all, I’ll respond to your bold claim that outside the Bible there is no historical evidence of Jesus’ existence. There certainly are. There are Josephus (a non-Christian Jewish historian), Tacitus (a Roman historian), the Babylonian Talmud (a collection of writings by Jewish rabbis), Lucian (a Greek satirist). I have read about these before, but you can see a summary of this evidence at http://www.probe.org/content/view/18/77/
You state that there are “No tax records, no statues, no monuments, no beyond-doubt reports.” There were no tax records of the average worker. There would not be any statues or monuments, because Christians are commanded to avoid idolatry. As to no “beyond-doubt” reports, here we come to a matter of opinion. In my view, the New Testament is beyond doubt.
You question the accuracy of our translations into English. Yet these translations are made directly from the *original texts*, not translated from earlier translations, as you seem to imply. Of course a translation could be politically motivated, but again, we can go back to the original texts. Many of the modern translations come from an earnest desire to preserve the meaning of the original texts. What faults have you found in your reading of the Bible?
Christians hold that the entire Bible is the Word of God, texts written by men as God spoke through them. Therefore the claim that the only meaningful bits are the direct, quoted words of Jesus goes contrary to what we believe. The practice of putting the words of Jesus in red text is not helpful, the whole Bible should be red text.
I’m not going to say anything on the issue of the historicity of Muhammad and Islam, as I simply do not know enough. As I have said earlier, I will try to inform myself better. How would you recommend I do so? Please recommend some resources for my reading.
There were no texts written during the time of Christ’s life. His active ministry was only the last three years of his life, so this isn’t too surprising. The earliest book of Paul’s is thought to be written in AD 51 and the first gospel around AD 65. This is starting at 20 years after Christ’s death. All the books were definitely written before AD 100, and possibly before AD 70 at the fall of Jerusalem. Some were written by eyewitnesses, and some by those who interviewed the eyewitnesses. I particularly like Luke, who was a doctor, and states in his introduction that he carefully investigated everything for the truth, for the benefit of his readers.
Moving on to the issue of political lineage, I think we have a misunderstanding. I did not claim there was a political lineage. Please read what you have quoted from me carefully. That there was enormous political and social change in Rome after Christianity was turned into the state religion (not a good thing in my book) is undeniable, which is all I wished to say.
Again, I cannot debate the historicity of Islam and I don’t wish to at this stage, but I do want to learn more. But to deny that Christianity has meaningful historical documentation is simply not true. And as to your comment on Islam being a “better example to study”, I’m at a bit of a loss. So we should study more only things that are better documented? We’d never study anything beyond what we already know if that was the case.
Moving on again, you state that Christianity does not require learning, only faith. On a superficial level this is somewhat absurd. How can you know anything, including your beliefs, unless you learn about it? Can you back your view up with something from the Bible? In Acts 17, we see that the Bereans were commended for examining the Scriptures to ensure the truth. Solomon is mentioned as being an accomplished biologist. Our worldview is one of a rational God who makes the world subject to rational laws, which can be investigated through the application of science.
And to conclude, you state that Christianity has no evidence. If you still believe this I suggest you read the Bible and the works of the authors I have mentioned above, for yourself. I in turn will investigate whatever evidence you give to me.
Jaken
=====
I take it you haven’t read up on that recently released analysis of suicide bombers? See a summary at http://worldnews.about.com/od/islamreligionpolitics/a/islam_terrorism.htm
Religion has nothing to do with it. The Tamil Tigers are one of the biggest users of suicide bombings and that conflict is not based on religion.
How are suicide bombers and religion the biggest threat to your country? I would think that corrupt government and poor education and health are a much bigger threat? Nations do stupid regardless of whether they are religious or not.
And once again, stating that there are no Gods cannot ever be a fact, as the statement is not falsifiable.
=====
Sorry my replies take so long, comes from being in Australia. Peace all.
While Agnosticism is often seen as hedging a bet, I would agree it is the more ‘scientific’ stance. Since I cannot find evidence of something I cannot always conclude it does not exist. I am reasonable certain there are no human/alien hybrids walking amongst us and I am as certain that there are no angels doing the same.
What fuels non-friendly Atheism is religions push against us. There are a growing number of people who believe The War on Terror is really a war on Islam. Now if the non-religious find this to be more possible, I imagine the Muslims feel it ten fold. The religious force their beliefs on us daily. Their laws and culture is constantly crammed down our throat. Have you ever seen a group of Atheists go door-to-door trying to convert people?
The religious have even gone so far as to declare Atheism a religion. I don’t know the originator of this quote but I love it “Atheism is a religion is as much as not collecting stamps is a hobby.”
I suppose it is quite true that even if we get rid of religion, the crazies would be forced to find another reason. But wouldn’t it also force the rest of the world to look at the REAL reason behind fanaticism and not just be able to sweep it under the ‘They have a crazy god, we have a just god’ carpet?
Gay marriage has been legal in Canada for quite some time. The earth didn’t crack open. the seas didn’t envelope the earth. Nothing happened. Straight marriages were not devalued or defamed. No straight couple said “Well if the fags can do it, screw it, I want a divorce”. It is just as it was. Why anyone could or would possibly care of gays want to get married is beyond me. Remembering that marriage is a state/province issue, where in law and in logic do we have teh grounds in which to ban it? We do not.
Atheist and Agnostics treat the world with respect and empathy. We do not need a book to teach us it is wrong to harm someone. We only need to know that the injured person could easily be us. Morality evolves as we do. As society changes, our guidelines must also change. The bible makes no reference to jerking off online with a 13 yr old…but we know it is wrong. Everyone knows it is wrong (with the possible exception of another 13 yr old).
So to the religious I say..if you want us to be friendly, stay out of our governments, stay out of our bedrooms and stay out of our lives. IF you do that I promise you won’t hear a peep out of me.
[...] Not so friendly athiest [...]
“Since I cannot find evidence of something I cannot always conclude it does not exist. I am reasonable certain there are no human/alien hybrids walking amongst us and I am as certain that there are no angels doing the same.”
In the seven-point scale, from 1 being absolute certainty of God’s existence to 7 being absolutely certainty of non-existence, there are very few 7′s. Dawkins places himself at a 6 in his latest book. When we say “atheism”, we don’t mean “I know for 100% certain that God does not exist”. What we mean is “I have been given no reason to believe god exists”.
That is an EXTREMELY important point. No one can say for absolute certainty in anything’s non-existence, but we can say that we have no reason thus far to believe in it’s existence. That may technically make me an agnostic, but I’m equally agnostic of leprechauns and unicorns, as I would expect are most who call themselves atheists.
Atheism is a none prophet organization
Hanlon, thanks for checking the comments thing. They appear on the page, then vanish, which makes me think it’s a mismatch between the JavaScript/AJAX component and the database component.
Josh: so, brass tacks – you state that you take the Bible as the Word Of God. The stance you’re taking apparently applies to translations, so you’re implying that somehow the Creator guides/influences/controls the translation process.
Now, how do you feel about Papal infallability? The same *claim* of Accuracy that you’re making about the Bible was made by Popes over and over again as they whored their way through history.
How is a person examining Christian claims about who is or is not Divinely Guided to know if we’re talking about your translators, who are rightly guided, or the Popes, who I think we will both agree are way off base quite frequently?
This Probe link: http://www.probe.org/content/view/18/77/ – here’s Wikipedia on the Tacitus part of it – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tacitus_on_Jesus
This stuff is *entirely* inconsequential as historical evidence goes. It’s *WEAK* and verifies almost nothing of the Biblical case, firstly. Secondly, you’ll see the issues much more clearly if you take a look at the quality and caliber of reportage we have on the historical life of Muhammad. *History* – not faith, but History – let’s us know a great deal about Muhammad. History has almost nothing to say about Christ – even if all these fragmentary mentions were really what your page says they are, it verifies the accuracy almost nothing of what is in the Bible in any historical way.
But, really, it comes down to this: if you *start* with the assumption that the Bible is correct, it’s a self-reinforcing system. If you don’t start with that assumption, the evidence is paper thin.
“But, really, it comes down to this: if you *start* with the assumption that the Bible is correct, it’s a self-reinforcing system. If you don’t start with that assumption, the evidence is paper thin.”
That’s a good sentence, there. I often argue with people over Biblical contradictions and inaccuracies from a historical perspective, and the ways in which they bend over backwards to rationalize them is only possible if the conclusion is pre-determined.
If one reads the Bible and isn’t told it’s all true, and is then asked to explain the disparities between books and occasionally with them, chances are he’ll mention varying authors, translational difficulties, and that some spots were modified or originally written with certain goals in mind. Raise him to believe it’s all true, then ask for that same explanation, and now things will get incredibly convoluted.
You can safely assume that you’ve created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do. -Anne Lamott, writer (1954- )
Whoops, I copied and pasted my entire earlier replies as well. Sorry guys. Hanlon, can you fix this?
Josh, it’d be easier if you just resubmitted the response as you want it to look and I’ll just delete the old one. Trying to figure out which parts you want in there is too tricky for me!
Done, sorry about that.
Hey again guys.
Vishay, yes, I do take the Bible as the Word of God. I’m not sure your distaste for translations comes into the discussion, because we can always go back to the originals. I personally don’t know Greek and Hebrew (something I would like to remedy), but I know quite a few people who do. You seem to suggest that meaning is immediately lost when something is translated. What basis do you have for this claim?
I’m not a Catholic, and I don’t believe there is any biblical basis for claiming Papal infallibility. It was the central issue of the Reformation that we should not rely on Tradition, but rather on the original Bible as the World of God. Popes are sinners just as the rest of mankind is. The “Roman Catholic Church” is a *human* institution, full of humans who often do the wrong thing.
And Vishay, you keep repeating on about how there is so much more evidence for Muhammad, while dismissing the evidence for Christianity. As I have said before, can you please provide me with some resources to look into this, because I don’t know where to start.
I’m curious as to what issues will I see much more clearly if I study the historical life of Mohammad?
I am not asking you to start with the assumption the Bible is “correct”, although this is a poorly-defined term. What do you mean by “correct”? I *am* stating that the Bible is a valid historical document, in its present form a 99.9% accurate copy of what was first written. It has the most supporting evidence of any ancient historical text. If you throw out the Bible as a valid text, you must by the same account discard most of history of that era and earlier.
Hanlon, you liked Vishay’s quote that I just addressed, which I disagreed with. We need to distinguish between the separate points of
1) Is the Bible an accurate historical text?, and
2) How do we read and interpret the Bible?
I have addressed the first point already, now to look at the second. It is important to read the Bible as a complete text and attempt to figure out the meaning. You cannot just jump in and grab a passage and claim that it says a certain thing, but rather analyse it in light of (a) how it fits with the rest of the Bible and (b) applying standard literary criticism.
Unfortunately, Dawkins is very guilty of not doing the second when he spends a chapter in “The God Delusion” tearing apart what he calls the ethics of the Old Testament. I just read that chapter and shook my head, because I don’t understand how someone who claims to be a scholar just approaches the Bible as a book of quotes.
I imagine that some of the passages you have difficulty with are creation, the history of Israel and the miracles that are described in the New Testament. Pick a couple, and I’ll talk about them.
Moving on to some of the other issues in the comments; regarding Dawkins scale of belief, I would place myself as a 2, for the same reason that Dawkins places himself as a 6. I am not 100% convinced in such a way that I ignore the evidence, but I do think that the evidence there is points to the existence of God. I wouldn’t call myself an agnostic though, not should you Hanlon, as we have looked at the evidence and decided what we believe. Saying there is/is not a God, but that we are not 100% sure is not the same thing as saying I don’t know if there is a God. Although this is probably just a semantic view. Seeing as the God/no God issue is a binary choice (ie there can’t be half a God), we must believe one or the other. Saying “maybe” is a lazy, anti-intellectual choice. We must look at the evidence and decide.
We seem to have deviated significantly from the issues raised in the original post. Can we at least address them a bit further? These points I addressed in earlier comments were:
1) It is wrong for a Christian to allow a non-Christian to do something he regards as sin. My response was; *no*, this does not “condemn them to hell”, not telling them about Jesus does.
2) We should not just accept the “holy books” as real. I agreed; we should investigate the truthfulness of them as historical documents, and then the truthfulness of what they say. Religion is not a free-pass.
3) We should be able to debate issues of religion. Absolutely, our society has gone mad with political-correctness. We should be debating the issues, genuine Christianity has nothing to fear.
4) “Moderate” religious believers are intellectually-dishonest. We never really defined “moderate”, but my thoughts on the issue should follow immediately from points 1-3.
Can you guys respond to these original points?
And Vishay, I am still waiting on some things to read on the historicity of Muhammad.
A well-reasoned response. Nice work.
I’ll try and make this one brief:
“You seem to suggest that meaning is immediately lost when something is translated. What basis do you have for this claim?”
There is the discussion of the mistranslation for “young woman” in Aramaic that turned into “virgin” in Greek. Realize that even the original texts are not written in the language that the stories were spoken in. Think about how easily things get mistranslated today, such as a movie. Now imagine if this were 2000 years ago and we were just going by word of mouth.
“I am not asking you to start with the assumption the Bible is “correct”, although this is a poorly-defined term. What do you mean by “correct”? I *am* stating that the Bible is a valid historical document, in its present form a 99.9% accurate copy of what was first written. It has the most supporting evidence of any ancient historical text. If you throw out the Bible as a valid text, you must by the same account discard most of history of that era and earlier.”
I mostly agree. It exists, and it is generally close to what was written initially. However, it is not in the same league as something like a history book or the accounts of Josephus (who, incidentally, often gets pegged as having a paragraph about Christ that he never actually wrote). It’s as real a text as any other holy book, however it’s fiction. It’s like the Odyssey or the Egyptian holy texts.
“I have addressed the first point already, now to look at the second. It is important to read the Bible as a complete text and attempt to figure out the meaning. You cannot just jump in and grab a passage and claim that it says a certain thing, but rather analyse it in light of (a) how it fits with the rest of the Bible and (b) applying standard literary criticism.”
This only works if you pre-suppose that it DOES all fit together and make sense. When Matthew, Luke, and John all have different phrases as Christ’s last words, or when they differ about whether he was arrested before or after Passover, only an apologist who is dead-set convinced that it all really does fit together will find ways to MAKE it all fit together. Some things, many things, simply don’t.
Moreover, it’s incredibly foolish to play this whole “well you have to try and look at it as a whole and apply criticism” and all these other things. It’s the Bible. If it were really the inspired and accurately true word of God, why in the world did he go so out of his way to make it so difficult to figure out what the hell he’s telling us?
“4) “Moderate” religious believers are intellectually-dishonest. We never really defined “moderate”, but my thoughts on the issue should follow immediately from points 1-3.”
I define a “moderate” as anyone who will take stances like “as long as you’re a good person you’re fine” or who see no problem with nonbelievers in their gods being amongst them. People who take the most abstract and unsupported stance in their religion, based more on what they feel than what’s in the book.
My original two points are more based on the fact that moderate beliefs are not based on the religion, but rather they are loosely holding onto the parts of the religion that they would believe with or without it. And the other half is that their wishy washy stance should not be considered good progress not to be argued against, because it shields the crazies by way of precluding us from arguing against God.
Hey Hanlon,
I have heard the story of the mistranslation of “virgin” before. While the word technically means “young woman”, it always refers to an *unmarried* woman. In the Israelite culture, sex before marriage was forbidden, so “unmarried young woman” is much more concisely expressed as the single word “virgin”.
I’m not sure what you mean by the Bible not being “in the same league” as something like a history book. We have agreed that we have a valid historical text, and I have claimed that it is more reliably so than any other ancient document, including the Odyssey and the Egyptian holy texts.
I’m also unsure of what you intend by claiming that the Bible is fiction. Perhaps you would care to elaborate further? I’m pretty sure you’re not denying the history of Israel or the existence of Jesus? Where then does the fiction come into it?
Regarding the text of Josephus, it is true that some of the famous passage about Jesus is disputed, namely the section which declares him to be the Christ, aka the King. However, the consensus seems to be that he did write something significant about Jesus. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josephus_on_Jesus .
Moving on to the issue of coherency, I disagree with the idea that presupposing coherency is the only way of finding it.
Let’s take your examples. Matthew records “And when Jesus cried out again in a loud voice, he gave up his spirit.” (27:50) Mark says a similar thing in 15:37; “with a loud cry, Jesus breathed his last.” Luke says “Jesus called out with a loud voice, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.” When he had said this, he breathed his last.” (23:46) To finish off with, John says “When he had received the drink, Jesus said, “It is finished.” With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.” (19:30) So the only possible contradiction is between Luke and John, since Matthew and Mark do not record the final words of Jesus. You could say at first glance that there is a difference, but note that John says that “he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.” That phrase seems awfully similar to “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.” Do you disagree? It just requires a bit of critical thinking.
As to the time of Jesus arrest, remember that the Passover is a night, from evening to morning. All four gospels record Jesus and the disciples having the Passover meal, then going out to Gethsemane and finally Jesus getting arrested in the early hours of the morning. Where is the disagreement?
Why is it foolish to claim that you need to read the whole Bible and figure out what it is saying? I am claiming that to be a genuine Christian requires using your mind and thinking about things. I can explain the basic outline of the gospel in a few short sentences, but that doesn’t mean that I turn my brain off and stop reading the Bible. And I am not claiming that everyone needs to become a theologian, but only that some do need to be. Once we know the basics, we can read the Bible and be taught by Christian leaders.
I disagree that it is difficult to figure it out, it just requires a bit of time and dedication, much like any other field of endeavour. Here’s my basic outline for you.
1) God creates the world and man, under his rule.
2) We reject the rule of God, choosing to do things our own way. This is “sin.” For this, we receive the punishment of death.
3) The history of Israel shows that it is impossible to please God through obeying rules and laws. We simply cannot do it.
4) God sends Jesus, his Son and future king to our world. The message he preaches is that we cannot get to God except through him.
5) Jesus dies on a cross, even though he committed no crime. In this way, he takes on the punishment for all of mankind’s sin.
6) On the third day, he comes back to life. He appears to his disciples and to many others.
7) His followers go out, first to Israel, then to the rest of the world proclaiming this very message.
If you are interested in actually finding out for yourself, I recommend reading Luke and Acts. The first deals with Jesus life, and the latter with the events in the few years after his death and resurrection. They are narratives written by the same guy, so it’s easy to follow the plot. Then I would read Romans, which is quite a heavy book, but it shows the relationship between the Old Testament and the New quite clearly, and is challenging in what it asks a Christian to do.
Finally, on the issue of “moderate” religion. Under your definition I would not claim to be a moderate. I disagree with “as long as you’re a good person you’re fine.” And my duty to the unbelievers around me is to tell them about Jesus, beyond that I have no problem in having them around me. (Not that it matters, but of my two best mates, one is an atheist and the other quite anti-religious.) And once again, I heartily agree that matters of religion should be open to public discussion. I have nothing to hide. Let’s find out the truth.
Hey Josh. You got me right before bed!
The virgin dealie is disputed. Again, it’s fairly foolish to insist that because she was referred to with a word that refers to “a woman of marryable age” that it means “virgin” because I’m positive a word for “virgin” existed.
I do not believe in a historical Christ. At all. And that’s a recent development in my beliefs, I’d normally taken the Jewish “well he was a good prophet and a teacher, just not the Messiah” stance until a little while ago. Then I noticed that outside of the Bible there’s nothing to suggest Christ was a real person, and the Bible himself paints a story that’s a generic ripoff of Mithras, Attis, Adonis, Osiris, Dionysis, etc…
“You could say at first glance that there is a difference, but note that John says that “he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.” That phrase seems awfully similar to “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.” Do you disagree? It just requires a bit of critical thinking.”
I -entirely- disagree with that, because it’s not actually written in there. You’re reading into it. Only someone who starts off believing they have to mesh somehow would draw such conclusions. There is no logical reason that three people would all disagree on his last words. You can’t find anyone else who has three separate accounts of his final words, recorded.
“Why is it foolish to claim that you need to read the whole Bible and figure out what it is saying? I am claiming that to be a genuine Christian requires using your mind and thinking about things. I can explain the basic outline of the gospel in a few short sentences, but that doesn’t mean that I turn my brain off and stop reading the Bible.”
That’s not what I’m saying. Unlike most, I have read the Bible. Plowed through in 7-8th grade, later took a college course on it as literature, watched a few documentaries, periodically pick through it online. What I’m saying is that it’s ridiculous to claim that the only reason some things don’t make sense is because you have to make some kind bizarre interlocking jigsaw puzzle out of the whole deal. As though each book was made INTENTIONALLY leaving out a piece that requires looking into another book to read.
If you read the Bible as an unbeliever, the whole thing makes infinitely more sense. When you try to figure out why Matthew and Luke are so different, for example with the different genealogies, it makes far more sense to consider that they were different authors with different goals and the books were written not with historical accuracy in mind but rather just to get a specific message across.
The books were written by a huge spread of people who never met and the canonical books were plucked out of a much larger pool. The Gospel of Thomas is a famous example, or consider the Gospel of Peter which has Jesus dying under King Herod. Why were the books chosen as they were?
It’s hard to tell, unless you actually believe that the early church fathers had some kind of a divining rod and could figure out which out of the hundreds of books were actually written by agents of God and which were by fakers. The more logical explanation is that they were chosen by men for whatever reason they had, but that the ones they picked were no more or less “inspired” than the ones that weren’t.
There’s a fella named Robert M Price who had a fantastic line in “The God Who Wasn’t There” (which I enjoyed but am not enamoured with as a film). He said something to the effect of “I found it impossible to read the Bible as though it were the infallible and inspired Word of God, it was like having a set of blinders on, there was just so much that didn’t make sense that way. And now I find myself again a churchgoer, and I love what they do there simply because I understand that it IS mythology.”
“(Not that it matters, but of my two best mates, one is an atheist and the other quite anti-religious.)”
It does matter. How do you feel knowing that your two best mates are going to burn in hell for all eternity? It sounds like I’m just being an asshole, but it’s a valid question.
Hey guys. Hope you all had a good weekend.
On the issue of “virgin,” the actual word we are talking about, which is from Isaiah 7:14, is the Hebrew “almah”. Some translations translate it as “young woman,” some as “virgin.” The Hebrew *dictionaries* say the word means “marriageable child, mature virgin.” It is used to apply to Rebekah (before she married Jacob), to the girl in Song of Solomon, and in a few other places in the Psalms. I agree that it is disputed, primarily by Jewish tradition, who don’t want to see the word “virgin” in Isaiah.
You state that you don’t believe in a historical Christ, not even the existence of the man. I will claim that in doing so, you reject the viability of all the ancient texts. I was intrigued by your mention of all those “rebirth”-based pagan gods, as they aren’t something I’ve looked into before. However, from what I have read, there is no written evidence about their practices until after 200 AD, so these texts can’t have influenced the NT. There is also no way of knowing whether the texts are an accurate description of the cult in the first century. And most Christian beliefs have their origin in the Old Testament anyway, far before these “mystery cults” arrived. And the “similarities” are really only obvious when the scholars describing the pagan practices in Christian language, such as baptism and resurrection, which is not supported by the ancient texts.
Of course, the claim that the Roman Christians co-opted December 25th as a “Christian” celebration is true, but irrelevant. The Bible does not say we should celebrate Jesus’ birth every year. The real reason for the practice was to appease the Roman populace, who still wanted their festivals.
Returning to the issue of Christ’s final words, you originally claimed that there was a *contradiction* in what was written. I merely showed that there was no contradiction, only that they didn’t all actually record the final words of Jesus. You claim that I am reading the agreement into the text, but I explained it *using the text*. I claim that *you* are reading a disagreement into it when none actually exists. Please support your conclusion *using the text*.
The bulk of your comment was on the coherency (or lack thereof) of the Bible, so let’s return to that. I never claimed that the individual books of the Bible don’t make sense on their own and that we have to make a jigsaw out of the whole thing. What I did claim was that the Bible has an overarching purpose, a meta-narrative, which you can discover by treating the Bible as a single unit given by God.
I entirely agree with you on the point that the authors were all writing with different goals. Take your examples of Matthew and Luke. Why are the genealogies different?
Well, Matthew traces back Jesus’ lineage back to Abraham. He adds in a few details on Israel’s history. Of particular importance are the references to King David, and the important *women* from Jewish history. That should start to give us the idea that Matthew is writing to a *Jewish* audience, who would care about precisely those issues.
Now, turning to Luke. This genealogy goes back to Adam, just mentioning David and Abraham as if they weren’t anyone important. There is no mention of any of the aspects of Israeli history. So why the difference? Well, Luke is written to a *Greek* audience in general, (to Theophilus in particular), who wouldn’t care too much about how Jesus fits into the Jewish history. Rather, this second genealogy is just showing us Jesus’ humanity.
Now, returning to the issue. Trying to read the texts from the author’s perspective and see their individual goals for their readers is a good way to read the text. In doing so, we see can see the individual details of how God carries out his plan through history. Your reaction to this seems to be that we shouldn’t have to read the whole huge tome to know what the message is. I agree, but you *do* get given the message; there are many paragraph and chapter lengths versions of the message in the NT. It’s just that to get all the individual *detail* that you need to read the whole thing.
I feel that there is still a subconscious undercurrent in your comments which says that religious believers need to switch their brains off and not apply critical thinking to the Bible, and that this is an admirable thing to do. I have been trying to persuade you of the opposite. I claim that we should be applying all the analytical tools at our disposal to gain a better understanding.
As to which books are recognised as canonical Scripture, it is not true as you say, that they were “plucked out of a much larger pool.” Rather, there are just a few disputed books and (relatively) new findings, such as the ones you mention.
The fact that the authors of the Old Testament never met is obvious, simply due to the time spans involved. But the authors of the New certainly did, and their writings contain details of these meeting and even of their disagreements on certain matters. The books of the NT were all written within a single lifetime after Jesus, definitely all before 100 AD and possibly before 70 AD.
The canon was chosen by men through consensus, but the “reason” that they chose one or the other is God’s. The “diving rod” you speak of is God!
You can’t make the case that one day a bunch of leaders just sat down with a mountain of manuscripts and decide to choose which were to be included and which to throw out. No, what happened is that individual books were already in common circulation and accepted by the consensus of the Christian community as Scripture, and the meetings merely formalised this.
The gospels of Thomas and Peter are rejected primarily because they are heretical. They portray Gnostic dogma and do things like anthropomorphise the cross, none of which is supported by the rest of Scripture, Old Testament or New.
And finally, on my non-believing friends, you are right, it does matter how I feel about them. But it was irrelevant in the context of the discussion. I was saying that I can quite happily coexist with them without, say, burning them at the stake for their unbelief, which is what you seem to claim I should be doing. No, I tell them about Jesus, and then it is up to them (and God). How do I *feel* about it? Saddened.
What I am trying to do here is argue the point that intellectualism and religion are not incompatible. I have “invented” an axis perpendicular to Dawkins’ 1-7 “what do I believe” scale, labeled “how much thinking have I done on the issue”. It is possible to be an atheist *or* a believer in God, either with *or* without having thought about the issues. And you and I, we are doing the thinking, which is backed up by both our belief systems. I’m enjoying the discussion, and have certainly learnt a few things from it.
Vishay, you seem to have vanished…
Sorry, I was a bit busy today: my refugee shelter system got written up on Treehugger, after I did an interview with the folks from the Sietch:
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2007/03/the_hexayurt_ef.php
http://www.blog.thesietch.org/2007/03/18/10-questions-vinay-gupta-creator-of-the-hexayurt/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMHACXotJAk (and made a video.)
All of this stuff is getting into Biblical stuff which only makes sense if you accept Christian axioms, which I don’t. http://www.godhatesshrimp.com/ is a really good read on the detail, but in general, I’m a Hindu from a 6,000 year old lineage. We were doing what we do long before Christ, and we’ll be doing it long, long into the future. If there was a second coming, we might well ignore it, and if anybody comes to try and throw us into hell because we don’t believe in their vision of God, they better come armed.
Hey Vishay,
Welcome back. Nice work on the hexayurt. Hopefully you’ll be able to help a lot of people.
I have seen the God Hates Shrimp site before. It’s pretty funny. I’m not sure what it has to say about Christians axioms or Hinduism though. It’s a response to an extremist position which can’t really be called Christian, in as far as they advocate violence against gays.
I think your last comment was possibly intended to be a bit off the cuff, right? I’ve only gone into the “Biblical stuff” because you brought it up, claiming “little or no historical supporting data” for the Bible. I’ve explained the evidence, while I’m still waiting on references for your claims. Unless you demonstrate otherwise, I think I can assume you just have an axe to grind on Christianity.
You stated earlier that you came to your belief “after spending several thousand hours in meditation.” And you chose it “because the evidence I’d gathered meditating fitted closely to the information contained in the branch of the tradition I had access to.” But you never actually say what you think, only describing Hinduism in general terms. What *do* you believe? How does it affect your view of the world?
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“God” terminates all discussion.”
That’s the point – God is to be Obeyed not dialogued into man’s compromise of what He said to do:
“Thou shalt not” etc.
When God happens to you all and you repent of sin (murder, hate, fornication etc.), you too will know what it means to be a Child of God under the Authority of Your Father Who created you. And being Chastened by Him is not pleasing but afterward it really does yield the peaceable fruits of Righteousness. God’s Word is the only (Holy) thing that works for those who are losted (missed).
Connie: Blah blah blah. Heard it all before and I don’t believe a word of it. But thanks for playing.
BTW: “losted”??
God happened to me when I was younger. Fortunately, I recovered.
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