Blog of the Week: My Feelings on Christianity/the bible

Proverbs said:

The Bible isn't contradictory. The passages from the second link are so taken out of context. When he says "I haven't come to bring peace, but a sword" He meant division. Hence why later on He says that he came to turn a father against his son, et cetera. Basically, Jesus is pointing out that He is going to be a huge dividing factor. The last one in which He tells His disciples to buy swords if they don't have one, I asked about that and some people think it's just to mentally prepare the disciples for what's going to happen. Regardless, Jesus rebukes Peter when he cuts off the servant of the high priest's ear (Matthew 26:52-54).

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I would have to say that, upon close and objective reading of the bible, that it is quite contradictory, not to mention a bit wacky at times.

http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contra/by_name.html

http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/abs/long.htm

Some of these (or a lot of them) may be small, almost unimportant contradictions, but for a text that claims (and other people claim) to be inerrant, even the slightest contradiction or inaccuracy will mar that. Not to mention, the considerable political influence such people have on setting policies and affecting other people's lives with their beliefs.

A couple specific examples include the alleged genealogy connecting Joseph to David (which, in of itself, doesn't seem to make any sense, since, according to the bible, Joseph is not really Jesus' father anyway, so why care about his genealogy? It would really make more sense to look at Mary's, but, alas, it seems logic was not a strong point of the various writers of the bible). Matthew expounds one list of names, while Luke writes up a different, much longer one, barely sharing any names between the two.

http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contra/gen_ml.html

There is even contradiction over when (and where) Jesus was born, and is even historically impossible in Luke's account.

http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contra/jesus_born.html

http://books.google.com/books?id=yq...6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=Dawkins Jesus born&f=false

There are also contradicting lists of the Ten Commandments.

http://www.positiveatheism.org/crt/whichcom.htm

I'm pretty sure that a lot of Christians consider the Ten Commandments to be still in affect, (even though there is contradictions about that in the bible: http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contra/otlaw.html), even according to Jesus himself.

However, what are the punishments for breaking those commandments?

http://www.evilbible.com/ten_commandments.htm

Also, in this link again.

http://www.positiveatheism.org/crt/whichcom.htm

Not the nicest rules ever, and the punishments seem ridiculously over the top in relation to the supposed crime. Not a very peaceful sounding book, or a peaceful sounding god/son (and this is not even mentioning the huge number of massacres and even outright genocides apparently committed in the Old Testament).

http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contra/peace.html

If Jesus meant division, why even use the word "sword"? Why not just, use, you know, "division"? Why even tell people to literally sell their clothes to buy swords?

Proverbs said:

And about religious tolerance--are you kidding? Jesus' entire ministry was centered around John 14:6 "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me" (NIV). Just because you think religious tolerance should exist, that doesn't mean that Jesus contradicts Himself or is wrong in any way. You're just making that judgment on your own.

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Well, that was certainly enlightening. Just because I think that religious tolerance should exist? Last I checked, that was one of the founding principles of this country, but I don't know, with some of these Christian political movements gunning for a theocracy, maybe that has changed as of late.

Anyway, while you don't have to agree with everyone else and their opinions, I always thought it was the moral and courteous thing to at least respect their ability to formulate and make their own decisions and beliefs (as long as it doesn't harm or adversely affect people, at least), and not punish them for disagreeing or compel them to agree with you. To me, that sounds pretty important to have a healthy, modern society, but, I guess, you feel otherwise.

Proverbs said:

About stoning those who don't follow, that's Old Testament, and I've talked about that already. But the Bible makes it pretty clear that not everyone's going to Heaven. In fact, Jesus says that few are going to. "Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it" (Matthew 7:13-14 NIV).

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Well, if heaven is at all like how it's normally described by people, I doubt I would want to go there anyway. That's, of course, presupposing that there is any form of consciousness that survives the death of our brains, which, I have to say, has no evidence to substantiate that is the case.

Proverbs said:

Edit: Also, Reaver, don't go bashing the Bible about not being a good source for life instruction. Read Matthew 5-7, otherwise known as the Sermon on the Mount. That composes 90% of people's morals today. Not so good for life instruction, right? A psychologist was recorded to having said that if we took all of the authoritative texts on psychology and compiled everything we knew, cleaved out any unclear language, and took all of the meat and none of the parsley, then we should have a very awkward and incomplete version of the Sermon on the Mount that would pall in comparison. Another therapist said that he just reads people Jesus' words and that's often all the 'therapy' they need.

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All I said is that the bible is contradictory, and "not the best for receiving moral and life instruction". If that's "bashing", then, geez, I guess you don't handle criticism very well.

Anyway, I never said that the bible was completely devoid of anything good, it definitely has some good bits and moments in it. Unfortunately, the bible tends to deliver an inconsistent message in that respect. For almost every good thing it states, there is something somewhere else that goes against it. Like, with the Sermon on the Mount, as an example.

http://www.inu.net/skeptic/sotm.html

My issue is that you can justify almost any sort of position in the bible. I normally don't have an issue with some of the more peaceful aspects of the bible, but it's inescapable that some people will take heart to some of the more violent and intolerant parts of the bible, and adversely affect other people's lives with their beliefs. Yet, it all comes from the same source. I think it's best to just discredit the whole thing, because I think it's very clear that we are capable of deriving a clear sense of morals without an ostensible "holy book", and rid ourselves of the people that find justification in them for truly monstrous acts.

Proverbs said:

Edit: Also, Reaver, don't go bashing the Bible about not being a good source for life instruction. Read Matthew 5-7, otherwise known as the Sermon on the Mount. That composes 90% of people's morals today. Not so good for life instruction, right?

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Contrary to popular Christian belief most of the good ideas within the sermon on the mount had already been used long before Jesus appearance. The principles had been around long before and sometimes in more detailed forms. Beyond just reusing known moral values at the time I would say that there is a lot of bad advice in the sermon.

Right from the beginning I feel it starts out pretty poorly. In Matthew 5:3-5, I feel that Jesus is telling people that it is righteous to be in a poor and weak state that would make it easy to be taken advantage of. This is actually made even more clear when you look at Luke 6:20-25 where Jesus states that bad things shall come to those who live well on earth and does not make exception in these sermons. Those who put themselves in a vulnerable state are rewarded while those who try to protect themselves will be punished. But beyond just the obvious poor implications of this, it is also following ideology that ends up causing people to not try to better the world around them. It promotes an idea of 'Don't worry about the condition of this life because the next one will be better', this kind of ideology can slow the growth of civilization since people are less likely to try to fix the problems that pledge the world. Either way, this concept obviously is a big part of the world today and is generally not accepted. We know better. Though this line might still provide comfort for some believers in hard times it is still just a collection of simple assertions without any justification.

Matthew 5:7-9, perhaps Matthew 5: 6 as well, focus on positive traits to live by. Though it is probably benefitual to encourage these traits the lines make it seem like the reason for doing them is to get into heaven as if doing good was not a reward in of itself. I do find some of this funny because there are times in the bible that I don't find Jesus to sound too merciful even though he is promoting it as a positive trait here. Perhaps these rules do not follow for the divine and are strictly for the general people but Jesus could have set a better example. The ideas here aren't that bad but asserting that these traits are just good because God rewards for them seems like a naive way to set up a system of morality. Personally, I believe that a divine being would know better than this.

Now, unto Matthew 5:10-11. I see these as being pretty bad advice overall. Beyond just justifing martyrdom, it gives an excuse for people to not to listen to critism and consider the rethinking their position. It justifies avoiding listening to critism and to continue the behaviors that someone is being ciritized for. I think this is bad advice, far from something that should be divinely inspired, that can discourage cooperation in a community. These are far from the moral code we have today that I feel incourages listening to critism and fixing your errors. Thats how we have come this far as a society in the last few hundred years and so I don't feel like these passages have a positive moral impact on our society.

Thats just touching at the very beginning. Since I don't have time to do a lengthy debunking of the entire entire sermon right now, I would suggest that you people read it and look for unjustified assertions. There are some several good ideas within the sermon but they were anything special as they had already been said countless times before him and he doesnt do the best job explaining them, an example of that would be when he is going over the golden rule. But there is also bad advice within it and doesn't seem to really have a solid theme.

A psychologist was recorded to having said that if we took all of the authoritative texts on psychology and compiled everything we knew, cleaved out any unclear language, and took all of the meat and none of the parsley, then we should have a very awkward and incomplete version of the Sermon on the Mount that would pall in comparison. Another therapist said that he just reads people Jesus' words and that's often all the 'therapy' they need.

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Yes, a singular psychologist could say and think anything but unless he can support what he is saying its pretty meaningless.

Reaver197 said:

Well, that was certainly enlightening. Just because I think that religious tolerance should exist? Last I checked, that was one of the founding principles of this country, but I don't know, with some of these Christian political movements gunning for a theocracy, maybe that has changed as of late.

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Yes, religious tolerance seems to be very healthy for a society. But that doesn't mean that the idea of nobody going to heaven without following a certain person isn't true, nor does it mean that trying to convince people of this is wrong. Both can coexist. One might ask why a god that created everything in the universe wouldn't make what consitutes a successful and productive society of his most prized type of life use the ideas and morals he set down in his book so we can more clearly see that it is the right path when we try to better ourselves but thats a completely different issue.