How often do we hear people “explaining” religious beliefs by stating “The Bible says so,” as if the Bible fell out of the sky, pre-translated to English by God Himself? It’s not that simple, according to an impressive and clearly-written book that should be required reading for anyone who claims to know “what the Bible says.”
Bart Ehrman’s Exploration: Who Changed the Bible and Why?
The 2005 bestseller, Misquoting Jesus, was not written by a raving atheist. Rather, it was written by a fellow who had a born-again experience in high school, then went on to attend the ultraconservative Moody Bible Institute in Chicago. Bart Ehrman didn’t stop there, however. He wanted to become an evangelical voice with credentials that would enable him to teach in secular settings. It was for this reason that he continued his education at Wheaton and, eventually, Princeton, picking up the ability to read the New Testament in its original Greek in the process.
As a result of his disciplined study, Ehrman increasingly questioned the fundamentalist approach that the “Bible is the inerrant Word of God. It contains no mistakes.” Through his studies, Ehrman determined that the Bible was not free of mistakes:
We have only error ridden copies, and the vast majority of these are centuries removed from the originals and different from them, evidently, in thousands of ways.
(Page 7). At Princeton, Ehrman learned that mistakes had been made in the copying of the New Testament over the centuries. Upon realizing this, “the floodgates opened.” In Mark 4, for example, Jesus allegedly stated that the mustard seed is “the smallest of all seeds on the earth.” Ehrman knew that this simply was not true. The more he studied the early manuscripts, the more he realized that the Bible was full of contradictions. For instance, Mark writes that Jesus was crucified the day after the Passover meal (Mark 14:12; 15:25) while John says Jesus died the day before the Passover meal (John 19:14).
Ehrman often heard that the words of the Bible were inspired. Obviously, the Bible was not originally written in English. Perhaps, suggests Ehrman, the full meaning and nuance of the New Testament could only be grasped when it was read in its original Greek (and the Old Testament could be fully appreciated only when studied in its original Hebrew) (page 6).
Because of these language barriers and the undeniable mistakes and contradictions, Ehrman realized that the Bible could not be the “fully inspired, inerrant Word of God.” Instead, it appeared to him to be a “very human book.” Human authors had originally written the text at different times and in different places to address different needs. Certainly, the Bible does not provide an an “errant guide as to how we should live. This is the shift in my own thinking that I ended up making, and to which I am now fully committed.”
How pervasive is the belief that the Bible is inerrant, that every word of the Bible is precise and true?
Occasionally I see a bumper sticker that reads: “God said it, I believe it, and that settles it.” My response is always, what if God didn’t say it? What if the book you take as giving you God’s words instead contains human words. What if the Bible doesn’t give a foolproof answer to the questions of the modern age-abortion, women’s rights, gay rights, religious and supremacy, western style democracy and the like? What if we have to figure out how to live and what to believe on our own, without setting up the Bible as a false idol–or an oracle that gives us a direct line of communication with the Almighty.
(Page 14). Ehrman continues to appreciate the Bible as an important collection of writings, but urges that it needs to be read and understood in the context of textual criticism, “a compelling and intriguing field of study of real importance not just to scholars but to everyone with an interest in the Bible.” Ehrman finds it striking that most readers of the Bible know almost nothing about textual criticism. He comments that this is not surprising, in that very few books have been written about textual criticism for a lay audience (namely, “those who know nothing about it, who don’t have the Greek and other languages necessary for the in-depth study of it who do not realize there is even any “problem” with the text).
Misquoting Jesus provides much background into how the Bible became the Bible. It happened through numerous human decisions over the centuries. For instance, the first time any Christian of record listed the 27 books of the New Testament as the books of the New Testament was 300 years after the books have been written (page 36). And those works have been radically altered over the years at the hands of the scribes “who were not only conserving scripture but also changing it.” Ehrman points out that most of the hundreds of thousands of textual changes found among the manuscripts were “completely insignificant, immaterial, of no real importance.” In short, they were innocent mistakes involving misspelling or inadvertence.
On the other hand, the very meaning of the text changed in some instances. Some Bible scholars have even concluded that it makes no sense to talk about the “original” text of the Bible. (Page 210). As a result of studying surviving Greek manuscripts of the New Testament, Ehrman concluded that we simply don’t have the original words constituting the New Testament.
Not only do we not have the originals, we don’t have the first copies of the originals. We don’t even have copies of the copies of the originals, or copies of the copies of the copies of the originals. What we have are copies made later-much later. In most instances, they are copies made many centuries later. And these copies all differ from one another, and many thousands of places . . . Possibly it is easiest to put it in comparative terms: there are more differences among our manuscripts and there are words in the New Testament.
In Misquoting Jesus Bart Ehrman spells out the ways in which several critical passages of the New Testament were changed or concocted. They are startling examples:
A.) Everyone knows the story about Jesus and the woman about to be stoned by the mob. This account is only found in John 7:53-8:12. The mob asked Jesus whether they should stone the woman (the punishment required by the Old Testament) or show her mercy. Jesus doesn’t fall for this trap. Jesus allegedly states “Let the one who is without sin among you be the first to cast a stone at her.”
The crowd dissipates out of shame. Ehrman states that this brilliant story was not originally in the Gospel of John or in any of the Gospels. “It was added by later scribes.” The story is not found in “our oldest and best manuscripts of the Gospel of John. Nor does its writing style comport with the rest of John. Most serious textual critics state that this story should not be considered part of the Bible (page 65).
B) after Jesus died, Mary Magdalene and two other women came back to the tomb to anoint the body of Jesus, according to Mark 16:1-2). They were met by a man in a white robe who told them that Jesus had been raised and was no longer there. The women fled and said nothing more to anyone out of fear (16:4-8). Everyone knows the rest of Mark’s Gospel, of course. The problem with the remainder of the story is that none of it was originally in the Gospel of Mark. It was added by a later scribe. Those additions include all of the following:
Jesus himself appeared to Mary Magdalene. She told the eleven apostles (minus Judas) about this vision, but they did not believe her. Jesus then appeared to the apostles, chastising them for failing to believe. He tells them that those who believe will be saved and those who don’t will be condemned. Then follows a critically important passage of the Bible.
And these are the signs that will accompany those who believe: they will cast out demons in my name; they will speak in new tongues; and they will take up snakes in their hands; and if they drink any poison, it will not harm them; they will place their hands upon the sick and heal them.
Jesus is then allegedly taken up into heaven and sits at the right hand of God, while the disciples go forth into the world to proclaim the Gospel in miraculous fashion.
Without the above passages (which, again, were not written by Mark) the Pentecostals lose their justification for speaking in “tongues.” And the Appalachian snake handlers have no basis for their dangerous practices.
C) John 5:7-8 is the only passage in the entire Bible “that explicitly delineates the doctrine of the Trinity (that there are three persons and God but that all three constitute a single God):
There are three that bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word and the Spirit and these three are one; and there are three that bear witness on earth, the spirit, the water, and the blood, and these three are one.
Ehrman cites strong evidence that this Trinity passage was entirely concocted and foisted upon Erasmus by outraged theologians who needed support for their prized theological doctrine (page 81).
—
Ehrman reveals numerous other difficulties with the popular assumption that the Bible was perfectly handed down from its original written expression.
Many believers rely fervently on the King James version of the Bible, for instance. They sometimes even say “If the King James was good enough for St. Paul, it’s good enough for me.” Ehrman points out many problems with the King James version, warning that “we need to face up to the facts.”
The King James was not given by God but was a translation by a group of scholars in the early 17th century who based their rendition on a faulty Greek text.
(Page 209).
So what should we make of the Bible? Ehrman argues that the attacks of the New Testament are not simply collections of obvious, self-interpreting words. It’s the same problem we have with other important documents, such as the United States Constitution:
Texts do not simply reveal their own meanings to honest inquirers. Texts are interpreted and they are interpreted (just as they were written) by living, breathing human beings, who can make sense of texts only by explaining them in light of other other knowledge, explicating their meaning, putting the words of the text “in other words.”
(Page 217) The scribes changed the original words of the New Testament by putting them in other words.
In my experience, many people who cherry pick excerpts from the Bible as the proper way to determine what is moral are in utter denial that we don’t have accurate copies of the original writings. Most of them refuse to acknowledge that current popular versions of the Bible contain numerous discrepancies, even compared to the earliest manuscripts we do have. This is on top of the fact that their are hundreds of patent contradictions in the English version of the Bible. To most believers, none of this matters. Stay the course! In fact, in my experience most believers rarely read what the consider to be God’s own inspired word.
Ehrman’s book points out numerous troublesome issues that demand attention even assuming that the original writers of the Bible accurately reported the events described in their original writings (whatever those writings were). The elephant in the room, however, is that none of the authors of the Gospels ever claimed to witness any of the events they were reporting. Further, the extraodinary nature of Biblical claims demands extraordinary proof that ancient self-contradictory writings are simply incapable of providing, except to those of us who believe that the Bible is completely true “because it says so in the Bible.”
For all of those people who continue to go around clentching and thumping those Bibles they bought at Wal-Mart, and for all the rest of us who want to get the story straight, Ehrman’s Misquoting Jesus should be required reading.
[Administrator’s Note: More than 540 comments were quickly contributed to this post, making this page too long to download and display. Therefore, on March 23, 2007, I closed off new comments. Last night (February 4, 2009), I discovered a WordPress plugin that allows me to paginate comments, thereby protecting the site from the sudden and repeated load of 540 comments.
Here’s the good news, then. Anyone who has not yet had his or her say on Bart Ehrman’s book may now jump in at the original post and post a comment. That’s right! If none of the 540 comments that have come before you didn’t address an important aspect of Bart Ehrman’s book, you may now remedy that omission, right here in the comments to this original post. Godspeed. ]
thank you for that analysis mknowlan…you may want to submit it for peer review in SCIENCE magazine. Then it might become a theory, and eventually a law like evolution and gravity. (using layman's terminology so you understand exactly what I mean)
Evolution in Action
by Rick Groleau
It's sometimes convenient, when trying to make sense of evolution, to think of changes within a species as having a purpose, as though mother nature has some intended goal that she sets out to achieve. "The bacteria want to survive," someone might reason when thinking about the declining effect of antibiotics, "and so they evolve into resistant strains." Of course, there is no purpose in evolution, just random mutations within DNA, most of which are detrimental to the survivability of an organism, some of which are beneficial. Because the beneficial changes can help the organism to survive, these changes are the ones that tend to carry on in subsequent generations.
A Brief History of Life
by Lexi Krock
For most of us, the Pyramids symbolize the distant past. After all, they're more than 4,500 years old. But for geologists and paleontologists, they might as well have been built yesterday. That's because these biographers of the primordial deal in increments of millions and even billions of years as they struggle to reconstruct our planet's life history, which is so vast that those 4,500 years would have to be replicated a million times over to reach back to Earth's beginnings 4.5 billion years ago. Looked at another way, if one were to measure our planet's age as a single 24-hour day, the first human civilizations would appear less than a second before midnight.
well, according to your post, you are indeed one of the great minds of our time. Your IQ of 139 makes you smarter than 99.99 percent of people (BY DEFINITION OF IQ- KEYWORD: STANDARD DEVIATION)
In your great wisdom, please accept my humble question to you…
WHY DO YOU AND YOUR KIND MAKE EXCUSES FOR THE BIBLE(GOD) and its obvious inconsistency when it comes to SCIENCE?
mnowlan writes: "I couldn’t free myself from my own blindness. God had to choose to reveal Himself to me before I could hear, to show me yet again that He is in control, not me. It seems impossible to accept, but it is not, because people do accept it. I hope you all do one day."
If God must choose to reveal himself to non-Believers, then Believers should stop bothering non-Believers with their exhortations to believe. Obviously, God has not yet chosen to reveal himself to non-Believers, so proselytizing to them is not just annoying, but is contrary to God's will. That it is contrary to God's will is further demonstrated by the fact that proselytizing is overwhelming unsuccessful. Thus, Believers who proselytize have obviously failed to listen to God when he has told them to spend their time elsewhere.
To grumpypilgrim:
Ahh, you do read my posts. Looking for another "chink" in my armor, I mean the armor God has given me. I must admit, you are complex, and you have some well crafted arguments. Here's the beauty of God's will. He uses us as His instruments. I can't know what is in someone else's heart, and whether He is speaking to them or not. He tells me to be obedient by "going and making disciples". Where does it say in the Bible, or where did I say that humans should sit still on the sidelines and let God do it all. He tells us to be active participants. To be salt and light in a dark world. We carry the Love of God inside of us. We are His temple. These things should sound familiar since you were once a believer, weren't you? So even though I don't know what is going on in someone's heart, I should still testify to God's Love in my life, in the case that God is really speaking to that individual. Now I know that encouragement and love can often be misinterpreted by unbelievers as being pushy. That is where most believers are classified "zealots" and "Jesus freaks". That's a sure sign that certain individuals are not really listening to God. Of course it is the habit of those still dying in sin to deny and project to others the condition that is their own. In other words their protestations at being proselytized against their will may also be a sign that God is revealing what sin is doing to their souls. My foundation is God and it cannot be changed with human arguments.
Now where is your evidence of proselytizing being "overwhelmingly unsuccessful"? Have you interviewed the billions of people in the world? It is billions, right? Because I have problems with numbers as pointed out by previous response postings. Would you at least admit that your assessment is limited to your experience and not make it a "truth" for everyone? Do you speak for God? Your "fruit" or lack thereof tells me otherwise.
To mnowlan:
Thanks for responding. I too can't stay away from this discussion. It's interesting to see how both "sides" are testing each other. I wish it weren't a matter of taking sides. Personally, IF there is a god, (remember, I'm Agnostic…always have to add the "if") I feel that it's possible that she created evolution. It's a "miraculous" process! But I have no desire to argue that with anyone because it's just a feeling.
I appreciate you getting personal with your response. This is where I wanted to go. But I still think you are trying too hard to dissect me and my question. (Although you should feel free to analyze me all you want. Life is a voyage of self discovery and to see yourself as others see you is often painful…yet always helpful.)
I'd like you to dig deeper inside yourself, if you will. Try thinking of it this way…do you NEED (there's that word again!) the miracles in order to believe? Strip them away. Ignore for a moment all the supernatural stuff. Would you still believe Jesus without all that? Or do you need "proof" of his authority in order to accept his message? This is a key question.
My theory:
Almost all of the staunchly religious people that I have met over the years have told me of their embrace of The Word in these terms…"I was at rock bottom"…"I had nothing to live for"…"my life was a shambles"…"I endured years of abuse"…"I had no one to turn to"…etc etc…"and then I found God!" I think you hinted at some such period in your life as well.
It seems to me that in order to embrace the Jesus of the bible one must undergo some kind of trauma. Drug addiction, sexual abuse, poverty, illness, alcoholism…all of these things have driven people to the refuge of the church. Hurray for them! They were the lucky ones who found a community that cares and found the strength to fix up their lives and go on, sometimes only one day at a time, but go on nevertheless.
Their salvation however is dependant on believing that there is something bigger and stronger than themselves that is attempting to take care of them. This is the crux of the matter to me. The NEED to believe seems to me to be directly related to the feeling of helplessness within.
I'm sorry, I know this is insulting to all the believers out there, but I've seen it too many times to ignore. (I'm 45 years old.) Weakness and trauma and fear = strict adherence to the bible. How else to explain the frantic denunciation of anyone that deviates from the strictest interpretation of the bible, as in the protests surrounding the movie The Last Temptation of Christ a few years back? Why does a different opinion about the life of Jesus outrage the true believers so? What do you care what other people think unless it's because it shakes your tenuous grasp on the mythology of Jesus.
If someone tried to debunk something I truly believed and held dear, I wouldn't react with outrage. Rather I would say to myself, "They just don't understand" and move on. The vehement response of the believers to any challenge of their myths reveals their insecurity and fear. "Don't take this away from me!", they seem to be saying.
I do not mean to insult…I merely observe.
I'm glad that you found something that helps you live your life and face death but your mistake is in thinking that if it worked for you then it will work for everybody. That is a special kind of narcissism. That is egocentric arrogance.
nmowan, you keep insisting that I need to be saved, as you were. You repeat that you hope God's truth finds me. Can you accept that just because believing in the mythology of the bible has helped you that it may not be the solution for everyone? No you cannot accept that, because the mythology itself prescribes that the ONLY way is for EVERYONE to believe and that's also why we must accept that we you and I will never see eye to eye.
To the person who responded recently as "to mknowlan":
There is a spot to identify your posting name and I think you are beginning your response to me as if it is your own name. It makes it a little easier if you actually use the same name in all of your responses. Anyway, I'm curious if you could show me where evolution became a law. I guess you aren't aware that Darwin's theory is still just that, a theory. I think you are confusing science with spirituality. I have said many times that I cannot prove God exists, since He is bigger than all the created universe. Science is driven by experiment and physical repeatability and is limited to the physical world and all the "evidence" that scientists uncover. One cannot prove God exists. It is the habit of humans to think that they can control the universe, and especially God, by claiming that only things that are "provable" exist. Just a selfish mind trying to justify itself.
Now for your randomness remarks… it is convenient for those who wish to believe everything happens without reason, just randomly, to believe such things. Did you every notice the term "random selection" in biology, now there's an oxymoron? Anyway, if everything happens ramdomly then there is no purpose to life, and life becomes whatever we want to define it to be. There is no law because everything is always changing, evolving. There is no accountability for beings living in a random world. Why is it then that we are so fixated on understanding the "order" of this universe? Even the scientists?
the beauty of Darwin's natural selection is that it can be observed today, just as it was when he DOCUMENTED it. He didnt make it up, he observed the animals of the Galapagos islands (look that one up naivemknowlan). These animals look very different than others on earth. They (animals such as platypus, giant tortiose) have evolved in isolation, because the Galapagos is over 1000 miles from any land mass. The "theory" of evolution is now accepted as 'LAW' by today's top minds as a result of repeated proofs and debunking of attacks.
Its great that you are still asking questions, thats how I eventually saw the light of "no-God". Granted it took me over 10 years of questioning, and study of topics like Anthropology, Geology, and Astronomy. To really get the ball rolling against "FAITH". Try not to be insulted that I have come to an alternate conclusion than yourself about the Truth of Evolution. It's like how Dr. Phil says, "I did what I knew how to do then, and when I knew better, I did better."
Think of the universe as a beautiful table setting. The tablecloth it sits on will be "religion". If you pull slowly at the tablecloth, everything topples down to the floor. However, if you snatch the tablecloth out quickly (do not try this at home kids) the beautiful setting will remain intact, even though the foundation you thought it needed is gone (the tablecloth/religion). Now what you have left is just as beautiful if not more beautiful (because, in hindsight the tablecloth was getting kind of ratty anyway)
For those (mknowlan) who have not studied science at all, a "scientific theory" is a highly regarded principle which cannot be disproven based on current knowledge. Identical to what LAYMEN (mknowlan) refer to as "laws".
To gatomjp:
I've returned momentarily for one purpose only – drop you a few links. Clearly you are captivated by what makes a christian "tick". Here is a forum you may find interesting:
Twixley, a non-believer, asks christians "What made you a believer?"
http://bibleforums.org/forum/showthread.php?t=649…
Here is where atheists, agnostics and non-christians only can start threads:
http://bibleforums.org/forum/forumdisplay.php?s=d…
This is the main forum page:
http://bibleforums.org/forum/
I hope this helps you.
Exit, stage left.
mnowlan writes: "Here’s the beauty of God’s will. He uses us as His instruments. I can’t know what is in someone else’s heart, and whether He is speaking to them or not. He tells me to be obedient by 'going and making disciples'."
Here is my question: when your god "speaks" to you in that manner, is the voice you hear male or female? Does the voice have a high pitch or a low pitch? Assuming your god speaks to you in the English language, which type of accent does your god have — is it a British accent, a Canadian accent, a German accent, a Scottish accent, a Mexican accent, a French accent, a Japanese accent, etc.; or, if it is is an American accent, is it a Brooklyn accent, a Minnesotan accent, a Texan accent, a Boston accent, an Atlantan accent, or some other accent?
I have "good Christian" values, however I do not believe in God anymore.
Here are a few links which provide the basis of my decision against a Creator.
http://www.becominghuman.org/
http://www.britannica.com/ebc/article-9367530
Genetic evidence points to an evolutionary divergence between the lineages of humans and the great apes on the African continent 8–5 million years ago (mya). The earliest fossils considered to be remains of hominins (members of the human lineage) date to at least 4 mya in Africa; they are classified as genus Australopithecus. The next major evolutionary stage, Homo habilis, inhabited sub-Saharan Africa about 2–1.5 mya. Homo habilis appears to have been supplanted by a taller and more humanlike species, Homo erectus, which lived from c. 1,700,000 to 200,000 years ago, gradually migrating into Asia and parts of Europe. Between c. 600,000 and 200,000 years ago, Homo heidelbergensis, sometimes called archaic Homo sapiens, lived in Africa, Europe, and perhaps parts of Asia. Having features resembling those of both H. erectus and modern humans, H. heidelbergensis may have been an ancestor of modern humans and also of the Neanderthals (H. neanderthalensis), who inhabited Europe and western Asia from c. 200,000 to 28,000 years ago. Fully modern humans (H. sapiens) seem to have emerged in Africa only c. 150,000 years ago, perhaps having descended directly from H. erectus or from an intermediate species such as H. heidelbergensis.
I hope this helps you. (Unfortunately, your links were insufficient in terms of credibility)
To grumpypilgrim:
I love your sense of humor. I'm guessing with your vast experience, which you neglected to recount for me, that you have asked this question before. Should I follow your lead and simply answer your question with another question? And not answer the question you posed to me? That seems to be your approach. No, I'll stick to my formula of actually attempting to answer your question. I believe God, in the form of the Holy Spirit, speaks to everyone differently. If you ask most Christians they would likely tell you that they have never "heard" an audible voice. We use the word "speak" because we have no better word to describe the communication that God provides to us. Since He knows what we're thinking I believe that He can "speak" to our very understanding without going through our ears. He can compel me to do things by placing strong desires in my heart and then placing events in my life that are out of the ordinary that fit that desire or "urging". Think of it this way. We type things in to a computer through a keyboard, right? Well, the people who make computers know that there are ways of inputing data directly to the motherboard without going through a keyboard. How is it that computers still work with arabic or spanish or french or whatever language? Because there is a common language in the computer that we don't see. One that is there from its "creator". You seem to be fixated on the appearance of things rather than the substance of things. God is not limited to accent.
To whomever keeps responding (recently) without an actual screen name:
My screen name is mnowlan, no k. I pay attention to detail in my life, and I ask the same of you. You seem to be willing to accept Darwin's theory as law based on your limited knowledge of the subject. I appreciate that you call me naive, but from my perspective I would call you naive as well. I will be the first to admit that I am not an expert on evolution, but my wife is. She and I have discussed it several times and I will try and recount what I know. There are things that scientists have "uncovered" that are not consistent with an evolutional theory. Such as fossils being found deposited in different sequences in different areas. The "proof" you keep alluding to is likely just the selective data that the scientists are using to justify their own beliefs. In other words, they're making the data fit their theory. Or worse yet, they are looking only at data that supports their theory and discounting data that does not.
I would ask you to identify, specifically, and I mean specifically, where it is that Darwin's theory has been proven and become law. Or are you just repeating what someone else has told you?
Yes, I am aware of the Galapagos islands fauna example. And I do not discount the idea of survival of the fittest, or the species that is most suited for its environment. Lack of predation, mutation, all play a role. My wife tells me that there can be evolution within a species, but it has never been proven that there has been evolution between species. I do not discount that once a species is here it can change. What I do not believe is that they just came into being by accident. The complexity of life, of even a single cell, is so complex that you have a better chance of forming a fully functional 747 out of a bunch of parts in a junkyard with a tornado then to form even the simplest life randomly. Look into the scientists who have come to the conclusion of intelligent design and really question as they have questioned. They began as skeptics and atheists and have changed their minds after looking at just a single cell with RNA and DNA. They have "evolved" spiritually. Or will you discount them as well?
mnowlan writes: "He [God] can compel me to do things by placing strong desires in my heart and then placing events in my life that are out of the ordinary that fit that desire or 'urging'."
This illustrates the difference between Believers and non-Believers. Believers have emotions and encounter events in life and imagine that a supernatural deity put them there. Non-Believers also have emotions and encounter events in life, but realize they occur regardless of whether or not they believe in a supernatural deity. Since emotions and life events happen regardless of whether or not one believes that a supernatural deity created them, there is no compelling reason to have such beliefs.
Another important truth that seems to escape mnowlan's — indeed, most all Christian's — notice is that it is possible to have spiritual beliefs, including a belief in supernatural events, and including even a belief in a supernatural deity, *without* believing that the Bible accurately describes that supernatural world. To many Christians, a failure to believe in the absurd god of the Bible means that the person is automatically an athiest, when in fact it only means that the person is an athiest *with respect to the absurd god of the Bible.*
This somewhat explains my refusal to address mnowlan's questions: from my perspective, the questions are nonsensical because they make far too many presumptions about the nature of god and spirituality. For example, with regard to questions such as, "Is there a god?" or "Is there life after death?", etc., my answer is that such knowledge is beyond human experience; therefore, I am, to some extent, an agnostic with respect to such issues. However, I am absolutely an athiest with respect to the absurd god and the bizarre afterlife described in the Bible. Angels…demons…Adam and Eve…a god-man who died, yet didn't die…a god who is inhumanly cruel yet infinitely loving…the whole thing is just ridiculous. I agree that the universe is a strange place, with strange properties that we do not yet fully understand, but I don't believe it could possibly be THAT strange, nor does available *objective* evidence indicate that it is. To the contrary, the Bible comes from a time in human history that was filled with wild superstitions, so it makes a whole lot more sense to me that the Bible is merely a written embodiment of such superstitions, not the inspired word of some invisible, omnipotent deity.
What I find most troubling about Christianity is that so many of its Believers declare that they are *certain* that the Bible is true, when such certainty is impossible, given the limited scope of human awareness. No one can know *for certain* that what the Bible says is true; thus, Christians who make declarations of certainty are either being dishonest or delusional. Accordingly, in both cases, they are not people I would consult for spiritual (or any other type of) enlightenment. And I would never consider electing them to run my country.
Thus, I would sum up my views of Christianity this way: the religion clearly offers many benefits to many people; however, to the extent that it fosters a sense of certainty, it is very evil and very destructive. If it causes people to feed the hungry and shelter the homeless, it's a good thing; but if it causes people to presume that they alone should dictate moral or spiritual values, then it is a very, very bad thing.
To KOKnockout:
"WHY DO YOU AND YOUR KIND MAKE EXCUSES FOR THE BIBLE(GOD) and its obvious inconsistency when it comes to SCIENCE?"
Because the science in the Bible comes to life more and more everyday. If you would like (if you have a lack of information regarding the Bible as compared to today's scientific facts, not theories) I will incorporate a list. Most atheists do not want to here any quoted scripture, thus, they fail to understand the simple text of the written Word.
I think like an atheist, but I am a Christian. In fact, the Bible says that this is how we should think.
To Grumpy:
Your words:
"This illustrates the difference between Believers and non-Believers. Believers have emotions and encounter events in life and imagine that a supernatural deity put them there. Non-Believers also have emotions and encounter events in life, but realize they occur regardless of whether or not they believe in a supernatural deity. Since emotions and life events happen regardless of whether or not one believes that a supernatural deity created them, there is no compelling reason to have such beliefs."
The Bible totally agrees with you! Read Ecclesiastes
P.S. Why are we back to the beginning of the conversation. Belief requires faith. You either have it or you don't. Most major evolution theorists back out of their theories at the end. You're not at the end yet.
Happy Trails!
Here is a multimedia presentation for your husband, who admittedly, "is no expert on evolution". Try not to be discouraged by all the monkeys, and watch the WHOLE presentation. Dumbknowlan makes statements like "life could not have randomly appeared", which is a STRAWMAN arguement, because evolution is based on probability, not randomness. Please tell him to continue to ask questions though, its fun to see him learn (albeit very slowly). Understand that it is somewhat insulting to my intelligence to read his posts about "evolution lacking proof", when I have provided ample links for him to self-educate.
http://www.becominghuman.org/
You need to CLICK this LINK to see the EVIDENCE for yourself!!!!!!!
Please feel free to COMMENT on the presentation DUMDKNOWLAN and the rest of the NAIVE.
Shortly after writing my last comment above, I read Erich's post about creationist claims (http://dangerousintersection.org/?p=696), which pointed me to the Index to Creationist Claims (http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/list.html). That Index led me to an article about the creationist claim that Hitler based his views on Darwinism (http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA006_1.html).
Reading that article about Hitler brought to mind the last sentence of my above comment: "If [Christianity] causes people to feed the hungry and shelter the homeless, it’s a good thing; but if it causes people to presume that they alone should dictate moral or spiritual values, then it is a very, very bad thing. According to the talkorigins.org article, Hitler actually based his views not on Darwinism, but on the idea of divine right — the belief that "better and stronger" people are obligated to subordinate "the inferior and weaker in accordance with the eternal will that dominates this universe." Hitler went on to say, "Hence today I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord." This is an excellent example of what I was referring to in my comment — that if Christianity "causes people to presume that they alone should dictate moral or spiritual values, then it is a very, very bad thing."
Another example, of course, is George Bush's unjustified invasion of Iraq — an act that had little to do with American national security and a lot to do with a president who presumed he could dictate moral and spiritual values to an entire nation.
To grumpypilgrim:
Engaging discourse. I would suggest that you do not speak for me and what I think about others. You are imposing, at least somewhat, your own negative stereotypes upon any one who claims to be Christian. Unlike your suggestions, I do believe that people can be spiritual, after all, I believe we are all spiritual beings, whether we seek/recognize God or not. I do not classify people as atheists simply because they do not whole-heartedly believe that Jesus is God, and to suggest otherwise is ludicrous.
I would also ask that you refrain from "dis"ing most of the population in the world, since most of the world is monotheistic (Muslims, Christians, Jews) and believe to some extent the validity of the Bible.
Now to sum up our life experiences as mere emotion with no divine foundation is a bit unfair. I would agree that not every experience is "supernatural" but to discount all experience as "normal" is also unfair. There are many instances of answered prayer that cannot be just swept aside as coincidence, or life events just randomly happening. There are also accounts of people being compelled to do things that do not make sense, and yet serve a higher purpose, such as the individual who was compelled to go to the Twin Towers after 911 and helped find the two missing officers that were pulled from the rubble.
I pray that God will give you a supernatural event in your life that you cannot just explain away. Until such time I think you will remain mired in your own world view. I don't recall reading that you admit the possibility that you could be wrong, where I have admitted that I may be. After all, it wouldn't be faith if I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt.
It is blatantly ethnocentric to say "most of the world is a monotheistic society." That just isn't true. Do the research.
Well said Grumpypilgrim, there never was a god, and there never will be.
I have finally looked at some of the evidence and it looks like you souless atheists are right.
Mnknowlan represents all that is wrong with the world today. Obvious from his patchwork posts. Amazing that he has the power of the internet at his fingertips, but does not click on links to educate himself, and would seem to enjoy impressing HIS (incorrect) beliefs on others.
Try reading some posts at talkorigins.org, and not just the ones from the Creationist side.
Or spend some time at the local university, or library, rather than trying to spit the venom of god at us — MKNOWLAN
Have you noticed that other creationists have begun to wise up and stopped posting their LIES? You are welcome to stay, but please try and have an open mind. We scientists have open minds, and are willing to change our views…because they are not "beliefs" as you say, they are interpretations of evidence. Most scientists wouldnt even STOOP to your level to defend science (evolution, cosmology), and you are lucky that I am willing to spend the time (and effort) to teach you the truth about nature and the fact that god does not exist (and never did). Beautiful world. Don't spoil it with preaching. If you have any comments about the multimedia presentation, which you really, really, really, really, really, really need to watch (really!!!). God wont be mad…trust me, I know.
http://www.becominghuman.org
Good, some truth mixed in with your post….
""I would also ask that you refrain from “dis”ing most of the population in the world, since most of the world is monotheistic (Muslims, Christians, Jews)""
Well you got that right, you are representative of the "average" person on earth. The average person…fyi…has less than a 3rd grade education, and believes in GOD. I ask you…as a person of above average intelligence and access to education, to become one of the elite, who can look beyond the hype of the church/synagogue/mosque/temple/sungod/teepee.
People you are not as intelligent as you might think.
You State:
"Or spend some time at the local university, or library, rather than trying to spit the venom of god at us — MKNOWLAN"
If you take just one library, or University and give me all of the knowledge that you have in all of the books contained in that library, you would know about .01% of all the information contained in that library. The numbers here can be performed using your own math since you are a above average genius. So there is still 99.99% of information out there that you dont have in your little brain, and you think that you have the answer about God.
To all atheists in this chat. Listen to yourselfs. you claim to have a higher education, yet you act and treat others like crap???? i thought education gave a person the ability to act civil. The monkeys that you believe in are smarter than you in this sense. LOL
Just amazing how much you all are still searching…… Why not let Christians be happy in their own ignorance (if that's how you feel)?? you guys press your beliefs on Christians more than they press their beliefs on you.
Go bow to your professors, who will more than likely find God before you do.
Without excuse…….LOL……….Enjoy your lifes you atheists, dont waist your time educating people that wont listen. Isn't that dumb????
mnowlan writes: "I would agree that not every experience is “supernatural” but to discount all experience as “normal” is also unfair. There are many instances of answered prayer that cannot be just swept aside as coincidence, or life events just randomly happening. There are also accounts of people being compelled to do things that do not make sense, and yet serve a higher purpose, such as the individual who was compelled to go to the Twin Towers after 911 and helped find the two missing officers that were pulled from the rubble."
mnowlan makes a common error among superstitious people: assuming that unlikely events are caused by supernatural agents. Let me take mnowlan's last example first: the individual who went to the Twin Towers after 9/11 and helped find two missing officers who were pulled from the rubble. I don't know anything about this individual, but I do know that a whole lot of people felt "compelled" to go to the Twin Towers after 9/11. The odds were good that at least one of them would make some "miraculous" discovery of a survivor yet, for superstitious people, this becomes the work of a supernatural agent. I remember hearing something similar when the last few people who escaped a collapsing Tower said that it was a "miracle" that they got out alive. No, it was obviously not a miracle: some people had to be the last ones out alive, and it just happened to be them.
Now, I'll address mnowlan's first example: "many instances of answered prayer that cannot be just swept aside as coincidence, or life events just randomly happening." This is yet another example of Christian selection bias with regard to prayer: ignoring the thousands of times that prayers are not "answered" while focusing on the few instances when they seem to be answered. I've written about this subject already: http://dangerousintersection.org/?p=449. In fact, the "many instances of answered prayer" can — and should — be swept aside as mere coincidence, because that is exactly what they are. In fact, no scientific study has *ever* demonstrated a statistical correlation between prayer and desired outcomes. The reason that Believers imagine prayers are answered is because they ignore all the contrary examples when prayers are not answered. It's like flipping a coin, counting only the flips when the coin comes up heads, and then declaring, "It's a miracle! I've flipped heads fifty times in a row!" The conclusion is invalid because contrary examples have been ignored. It is the same with Believers who claim their prayers have been "answered." Christians pray continually about all sorts of things so, inevitably, some of the things they pray about will come to pass; therefore, it is reasonable to expect that some of these prayers will appear to be "answered" when in fact it is just a statistical probability that has nothing supernatural about it. Indeed, I would put the question to mnowlan: in the past year, count the number of unique prayers you have made, and then count the number of these prayers that you believe have been answered. If you are honest, then you will acknowledge that the number of "answered" prayers are a tiny fraction of the total number of prayers that you made.
I've seen Believers make this mistake many times. They will pray for the health of a friend who is dying of cancer: if the friend survives they will call it a "miracle" or "an answer to prayer," but if the friend dies they will completely ignore that they had prayed about it and will, instead, call their friend's death "God's will."
I saw another example on a Christian television program. Someone was talking about how, after much prayer, he had believed that God had called him to open a Christian bookstore, but the business was a hopeless failure. Again, rather than acknowledge that God had failed him, both by giving him faulty instructions about opening the bookstore and by failing to give him sufficient support once the bookstore was open, he wrote the failure off to "God's will."
This is one reason why Christianity has survived for two thousand years: it was built upon a deep foundation of selection bias. Believers were carefully and fervently taught to ignore their multitude of prayers that were not answered while declaring as "miracles" the few that seem to be answered.
Again, please read my previous post about this subject.
To all my adoring fans:
Your love just overflows. I think that most of my believer brothers and sisters have stopped posting because they have given up on you. I haven't and God especially hasn't. I will suffer the barbs and arrows of your casted aspersions. I do have a college degree by the way. Your elitist attitudes are spilling through your words my friends. And grumpypilgrim implies that Christians have Hitleresque attitudes?! I wouldn't be surprised if the next postings from you started having expletives. And your insistence on misspelling my screen name is just peachy. Are you trying to get me angry because I've asked you otherwise? It sounds like quite a mature thing to do from such an educated one such as yourself, whatever your anonymous screen name is.
I will look into your talkorigins.org and other websites, to "educate" myself on the opinions of others. I am a little disappointed that you are all so full of yourself that you can't admit that you might be wrong. And degrading a large portion of the planet by equating religion with a lack of education really shows your true colors. Do you really think you are blessing me with your presences and responses? Sounds a bit narcissistic to me. Not surprising I must say sadly.
And projecting intolerance upon someone who has been more than tolerant of your postings is depressing. I can't understand how one can equate religion with Hitler just because he feigned the appearance of being religious as a mask to the world. Followers of a God of Love will be known by their love, and Hitler was certainly the opposite of what Jesus taught, even though he faked his belief in God. As an analogy, do you equate all drivers of the world with someone who uses a car as a weapon?
Unlike your assumptions I will never force any one to believe what I believe. Spirituality, especially Christianity is a voluntary exercise (voluntary on God's part and on ours), and I have no right to impose my beliefs on any one. However, if I live in a democratic republic and there is a majority of people that vote on an issue as I do, I will abide by that decision, unless it is to murder, such as with abortion. Now am I raising the ire of you pro-choicers? I have no idea whether any of you are pro-abortion, but I would at least challenge you to call yourself what you are if you are. Claiming that by "choosing" your action makes it right is frightening. That sounds more Hitleresque than anything that I have said. Does looking in the mirror hurt?
Now, people, do you really think that I am forcing my religion down your throat by typing at a keyboard, while you can come and go from your computer, and you can choose to skip over my writings and disregard them since you know that I am a believer in Jesus? Oh I forgot, you are trying to save me, because you know that God won't be mad at me for indulging in selfishness. I guess I should believe you all since you "looked at some of the evidence and it looks like the atheists are right". Your exhaustive research is so compelling.