Punctum Saliens

This is the second in a series of posts that began here. When we last left our intrepid Christian — defender of the one, true Jesus — she was not sleeping too well because of the constant, nagging fear that she should be doing more to spread the name of Jesus throughout the world. How else would poor, hopeless souls find their way to Heaven and avoid the eternal torment of Hell? And how could her God, a God of love, send so many to Hell just because they were born at the wrong time and in the wrong place? Shouldn’t there be some way for them to change their destiny?

Then she went to church and her faith in her God was restored because of what she heard. For her pastor was preaching from Romans 1:18-21

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened.

Whew! Our intrepid Christian sighs a great sigh of relief. All is well with her faith in her all-loving God. For, as her pastor so eloquently relays to her, God has nothing to do with all those souls going to Hell. It seems that they have known about Him the whole time and have made a conscious decision to reject Him. So, of course, they deserve the eternal damnation they are about to receive.

Paul tells us that both God and the Christian are absolved of all responsibility for anyone going to Hell because, from the beginning, God’s “invisible attributes … have been clearly seen.” Well, that makes sense, doesn’t it? Invisible attributes … clearly seen … how could I have been so blind? Through nature, i.e. “what has been made”, God has made Himself evident to everyone and “they know God” but do “not honor Him as God.” So, everyone — no matter when or where they were born — can know God and know Him as God.

Well, this does seem evident to me. Afterall, how many cultures have gods derived from nature? There are sun gods, moon goddesses, gods of the harvest, gods of war, goddesses of fertility, gods of wine. After all, religion is one of the things that make us humans human, right?

One problem is that, in practice, this really doesn’t work out the way Paul says it can. When was the last time you heard a missionary speak at your church’s annual Missionary Convention (you have one of those, right?) and give the following report:

“We bushwacked through the jungle into the remotest part of the country, to a place where no outsider had ever been, and stumbled upon a small tribe of natives who were holding a baptism service in which they were baptizing ‘in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit’. They then recited the Lord’s Prayer, said the Apostle’s Creed, and held an alter call for the neighboring tribes after which the pastor started hut-to-hut visitation to minister to the shut-ins.”

This may sound silly, but think about what it would take for someone you didn’t know anything about to convince you that their religion was the same as your religion. And let’s say that they didn’t go to church or have a copy of The Bible? Without those two things, would it even be remotely possible?

The second problem we saw in the previous post. Just believing in God is apparently not enough. You have to get from God to Jesus. And not just any Jesus but The Jesus of The Bible. This part is not mentioned here by Paul. They could have a virgin-born-son-of-a-god miracle-working tree-crucified rose-from-the-dead god-man and it still wouldn’t be close enough to The Bible’s Jesus to get them into Heaven.

Furthermore, this is being written by a man who spoke directly to Jesus and not from a man who actually found the “right” God from nature. In fact, I know of no one mentioned in the Bible — Old or New Testaments — who found God from nature. Everyone either spoke directly to God/Jesus or heard about God/Jesus from someone else. Please correct me if I’m wrong, here.

So, all this “God is evident from nature” is either a rationalization to make us feel better about God and about ourselves for not “getting out there” more or it is a flat out lie. Either way, it allows us to anathemize the “poor souls” so their ending up in Hell doesn’t seem quite so bad. Plus, we can all sleep better at night, feeling safe and secure in the loving arms of our loving God and knowing that those in Hell have no one to blame but themselves.

But wait … and stay tuned …

A brief digression for more “Pearls of Logic” from C. C. Ryrie.

From the Introduction to the First Letter of Paul to Timothy:

Some have questioned whether Paul himself wrote these letters … There is no argument against Pauline authorship that does not have a reasonable answer. And, of course, the letters themselves claim to have been written by Paul. (Emphasis mine)

From A Synopsis of Bible Doctrine:

The Bible is self-authenticating and church councils have only recognized the authority inherent in the books themselves. (Emphasis mine)

Need I say more????

What does it take to get to Heaven? According to many Christians, all you have to do is believe:

1. Jesus was the Son of God
2. Jesus was born of a virgin
3. Jesus was crucified for our sins
4. Jesus rose from the dead
5. Jesus will come to earth a second time

Sounds simple enough. But the entire thing depends on believing certain facts about a certain historical person. You can’t get by on believing in a god — or even in The God — alone. You must believe in Jesus and you must believe the above five things about Him.

May still sound simple to those of you reading this, but project yourself back to the year 1000 in what is now called Florida. Or to anywhere in Australia before the first Europeans arrived in the 1700′s. Or to certain parts of Africa or Asia today that are not “on the beaten path.” How could you possibly come up with all those facts about a person who lived long before you in a place you probably never dreamed existed? But if you didn’t believe, you were doomed to Hell. At least you’d have lots and lots of company — just think about how many billions of people throughout history have lived outside the “circle of influence,” that is, outside the regions where news of Jesus had spread.

But, surely, there’s a way around this, right? Surely, all these people are not damned for all eternity simply because they were born in the wrong place and at the wrong time? Surely it must be possible to intuit Jesus as the Son of God, intuit His virgin birth and death and resurrection, and intuit His second coming, right? No one really needs to hear all this from somebody else, does one?

Well, it just so happens that it is possible to come up with Jesus without hearing about Jesus from someone who heard about Jesus from someone who heard about Jesus … The ancient Greeks did it. They called him Dionysus instead of Jesus but Dionysus was born of a virgin, was the son of a god, was killed, and rose from the dead. Not bad, huh?

But is belief in Dionysus the same as belief in Jesus? Will belief in Dionysus get me into Heaven? My bet is that just about any Christian you talk to will have one of two answers: “Dion who?” or “No!” Let’s even assume, hypothetically if you must, that Dionysus is going to “come again” so that we have all of the fab five. The answer would still be “No!” Why? Because Dionysus was a pagan god. He wasn’t really God’s Son. He wasn’t Jesus.

But what’s in a name? “That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet,” would it not? Don’t Jesus’ origins and actions make him Jesus? Is there really a sixth criterion — “Thou shalt call His name Jesus?” that we forgot to mention?

Aside from the obvious (i.e. “You have to believe in my ‘Jesus’ and not your ‘Jesus’ because if you believe in your ‘Jesus’ I don’t have as much control over what you believe and, therefore, over you”) I think the reason is that the five facts about Jesus are not the whole story. The whole story is the surrounding drama and historical context. Jesus was Jesus for a lot more reasons than the five listed above. He was Jesus because He was born in Bethlehem, was of the house of David, rode on a donkey, was betrayed, was crucified, and so on and so forth. Jesus was Jesus because He was the Jesus that was predicted in the Old Testament. And only the Jesus predicted in the Old Testament could be the True Jesus. In other words, you can’t just believe in Jesus. You’ve got to believe in The Jesus of My Bible and therefore you have to believe in My Bible and all that entails.

So, what does the Christian do with all those poor souls who are ending up in Hell? How does the Christian sleep at night knowing that right now, this very instant, probably thousands of people are dying without even hearing the name “Jesus”?

In other words … If You’re Gonna Send Billions of People to Hell, You Gotta … stayed tuned for more …

The program did what? Oh, that! That’s not a bug. I meant for your hard drive to be erased when you typed the sequence ctl-alt-cmd-tab-G-7. That’s a feature of the program.

For Christmas in 1981, my parents gave me The Ryrie Study Bible (which I still have). There is a Synopsis of Bible Doctrine written by C. C. Ryrie, himself. Under the section titled The Inspiration of the Bible is the following item:

Neither do we deny that there are problems in the text that we presently have. But problems are quite different from errors. Indeed, in the face of the claims that the Bible apparently makes for itself about inspiration and inerrancy, it would seem more reasonable when confronted with problems to place one’s faith in the Scriptures which have been proved to be true again and again than in any fallible human opinion. Man’s knowledge of these problems is limited and has in some instances been proved to be wrong. Time will undoubtedly continue to bring to light facts which will help solve the yet unsolved problems in the Bible. (Emphasis mine.)

So, the claim as follows:

1. This apparent error is not really an error but just a problem we can’t figure out because
2. the Bible doesn’t contain any errors because
3. the Bible is 100% true because
4. the Bible, itself, claims to be 100% true and because
5. the Bible doesn’t contain any errors

Or the condensed version: The Bible doesn’t contain any errors because the Bible doesn’t contain any errors.

Got that?

A quote I found on Rant Fever (and several other places) from Ravi Zacharias, a Christian apologist:

Atheism comes from, literally, the Greek word a-, ‘the negative’; and theism, the word theos for ‘god’ — ‘negative God’ or ‘there is no God.’ It is affirming the non-existence of God. It affirms a negative. Anyone with an introductory course in philosophy recognizes that it is a logical contradiction. It would be like me saying to you, ‘There is no such thing as a white stone with black dots anywhere in all of the galaxies of this universe.’ The only way I can affirm that is if I have unlimited knowledge of this universe. So to affirm an absolute negative is self-defeating, because what you are saying is, ‘I have infinite knowledge in order to say to you, “There is nobody with infinite knowledge”.’ Atheism, as a system, is self-defeating.

The basic argument is: to prove that a white stone with black dots does not exist you would have to look at every single stone in the entire universe. However, to prove that a white stone with black dots does exist, you simply have to find a single white stone with black dots. Since the negative, the “a-stoneism” so to speak, is impossible (given a human’s limited knowledge and sub-light-speed travel ability) it is a logical contradiction, according to Zacharias.

Sounds pretty straightforward, right? Even though stones are a little different than gods or God the contradiction still seems to hold water in God’s case — saying that God does not exist is equivalent to saying that you definitely know that there is no God anywhere in the universe. But how can you know that if you’ve not been everywhere in the universe?

Ok, let’s ignore the logistical implications of looking for God the same way we look for stones and the philosophical implications of equating a physical object with a non-physical being … or spirit … or whatchamacallit. Instead let’s move to the other half of the argument. If it’s easier to prove a white stone with black dots does exist than it is to prove that it doesn’t then it should be easier to prove that God does exist than it is to prove that He doesn’t, right? I mean, come on. All you have to do is find one — I mean Him! (This will be left as an exercise for the interested reader.)

Now, I’ve heard Zacharias speak. Many years ago I even walked down the isle to re-dedicate my life to God during one of his sermons. (Or was it re-re-dedicate?) And I’ve read some of his books. So, I have a good idea where his arguments tend to end up.

In a nutshell, Zacharias is not a religous pluralist. That is, he believes that Christianity is the one and only true religion and that all other religions are false. He lumps atheism in with religion and so it lies under the “false” category. Fair enough. But Zacharias seems to stop short in his argument about atheism. In my opinion, he doesn’t take it far enough — doesn’t take it to its logical conclusion.

And the logical conclusion is that Zacharias’ argument actually supports religious pluralism! Think about it. If it is a logical contradiction to say that there is no God, then it’s also a logical contradiction to say that there is no God.

Did you notice what I did there? The first ‘God’ implicitly refers to the Christian God of the Bible. The second ‘God’ implicitly refers to Allah of Islam or to Shiva of Hinduism or to … Zacharias’ argument is not specific to his Christian God and so is applicable to the Gods of many religions.

I guess Zacharias is a religious pluralist after all!

Pretty sneaky, sis.

I’m starting a series of posts motivated by the book Why I Am Not a Christian and Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects by Bertrand Russell (1957). I’ll tell you up front that I agree with some of what he says and disagree with some of what he says. I think some of his opinions are right on and others are ill-conceived, illogical, and totally ridiculous.

First from the Preface, written by Russell himself:

I think all the great religions of the world — Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity, Islam, and Communism — both untrue and harmful. It is evident as a matter of logic that, since they disagree, not more than one of them can be true.

A classic argument. Interestingly enough, some Christians make the same claim and use it in their “proof” that Christianity is the only true religion. One oft used “proof” is the Blind Men and the Elephant analogy (also here). The claim is that everyone is totally wrong. Everyone, that is, except for the Christian citing the example and those in his camp who have the ability to somehow see the “real” truth. The problem is that he doesn’t place himself anywhere near the blind men or the elephant. He, apparently, has super powers that let him step out of the scenario, shed his blind fold, see the elephant as an elephant, and allow him to condemn all those poor, poor blind souls to hell for all of eternity. Sort of reminds me of Captain Kirk in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Kahn when he admits to reprogramming the computers during the simulation test and, thereby, wins the unwinnable scenario. All too convenient, if you ask me.

Let me remind the gentle reader what we are discussing here. We are talking about God, Allah, Brahman, Atman, etc., etc., etc. We are talking about a being that creates entire universes by speaking. We are talking about a being that knows our innermost thoughts and feelings. We are talking about a being that is totally beyond our comprehension, our imagination. And yet one religion gets it right?

Let me use a contrived example to illustrate. You, me, and Bob are sitting around drinking some really, really good bourbon. Bob says, “I’m thinking of a number between 1 and a gazillion. Guess what it is.” You immediately shout out “42.” I immediately start screaming at you “You’re wrong! It’s not 42. How could it be 42? It’s 7427466391!” and begin flicking lit matches into your hair to simulate the eternal torment you will endure in hell because you are wrong.

That pretty much describes the situation. I can no more know what number Bob is really thinking of than can our elephant-seeing Christian really, truly, completely know God. And if he cannot really, truly, completely know God how can he say that someone else’s understanding of God is wrong?

Paul even backs me up in I Corinthians 13

9. For we know in part, and we prophesy in part.
10. But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.
11. When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.
12. For now we see through a glass, darkly, but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.

This is Paul talking. You know, St. Paul. The guy who spoke to Jesus — and Jesus spoke back! The guy who wrote a fair amount of the New Testament. He, St. Paul, said that “now I know in part.” Even St. Paul didn’t have all the answers; even he didn’t know what number Bob was thinking of. Is Zacharias really claiming that he knows more than St. Paul? If Paul only knew “in part,” then we, not having spoken with Jesus directly, can only know a fraction of an “in part” and that’s probably not a whole hell of a lot.

But what does this have to do with ol’ Bert? Russell seems to undervalue religion when he claims that conflicting religious ideas cannot both be right because he assumes that man can know god (in whatever form you want to picture god) completely enough that he is able to pass judgement on another idea of god. He also seems to overvalue man’s ability to “know”; if I don’t have the full picture and you don’t have the full picture then who’s to say that both our ideas are not two different aspects of the same, full picture?

For example, let’s assume that god is a cylinder and you and I, in our imperfect, limited, all-to-human knowledge can only see projections of god. I look at god and see a rectangle. You look at god from a different angle and see a circle. Are our two viewpoints necessarily mutually exclusive? Well, obviously not because god is neither a rectangle nor a circle — god is something beyond both our ideas.

In fact, the real answer is to combine our apparently-disjoint knowledge which would allow us all to refine our ideas of god. It’s like those SAT questions where you are given three projections of a three-dimensional object and have to pick the right shape. If you only have a single projection, there is no way you can get the right answer because you don’t see all the details of the object’s surface.

It seems to me that what we really need to do is take the most disparate religious ideas and try to fit them together for it is the disparity itself that tells us we are looking at very different parts of God or we are looking at God from very different angles. It also seems to me that the mystic religious traditions do exactly this. Mystic Christianity has a lot more in common with mystic Islam and mystic Judaism than the main-stream religions have in common with each other.

First of all, look at Matthew 6:

19. Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal:
20. but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal:
21. for where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

These are words spoken by Jesus. So, Christians should not have bank accounts or stock portfolios or IRAs or money under the mattress for these are all “treasures upon earth.”

“But,” you say. “But what will we eat? What will we wear? How will we afford to live during retirement? How will we provide for our families?”

Well, Jesus addresses some of these very questions. Look a few verses later…

25. Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?
26. Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?
27. Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature?
28. And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin:
29. and yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
30. Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith?
31. Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed?
32. (For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.
33. But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.
34. Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.

Jesus’ answer to all our worries is “take no thought for the morrow!” I guess the original “Don’t worry; be happy.” He claims that if He takes care of the birds and the flowers and if you are so much more than the birds and the flowers that He will take care of you. Pretty radical, huh?

I mean, just imagine, having faith. Faith in an all-powerful, all-knowing, loving God capable of creating the entire world by simply speaking! Why do we think we need to help out God by balancing our portfolios and working our asses off 50 and 60 hours a week to bring home the bacon? God says that He will take care of us. He knows that we need to eat and drink and have clothing (see verse 32) and He will provide.

This is directly from Jesus. He is telling us how to live our lives. Christians are supposed to be like Jesus and do what He tells us to do. Why do so many simply ignore Jesus’ direct words? I’ve heard pastors and teachers talk about these verses but they always talk about getting through “rough times”, there’s a “light at the end of the tunnel.” When you’re out of work, take heart. God will provide. But I don’t read it this way. Jesus is not talking about times “between jobs.” He’s talking everyday.

What’s more, the early church believed this and acted on it! Look at Acts 2:

44. And all that believed were together, and had all things common;
45. and sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need.

They seemed to really believe what Jesus said about riches in Matthew 19:21

If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come and follow me.

Jesus spoke these words to a young man who had kept all of God’s laws since he was a child. And don’t forget the camel and the eye of a needle comment Jesus makes.

Jesus was poor. His followers were poor. His early church sold possessions and land and gave the money freely to anyone who needed it. But so many in the church today, Christians of today, don’t seem to be listening to Jesus’ words anymore. They are worried about tomorrow and believing what Jesus said. They are basically calling Jesus a liar or not powerful enough to follow through on what He said.

That’s a pretty weak God they want the rest of the world to believe in.

On bartleby.com both God’s “The Bible” and Darwin’s “The Origin of Species” are listed under Nonfiction.

dictionary.com defines nonfiction as

“the branch of literature comprising works of narrative prose dealing with or offering opinions or conjectures upon facts and reality, including biography, history, and the essay”

But how can both books be based on facts and reality?
Hmmm…..

I was taught that I needed a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. To this day I am not sure what that means. Growing up, I thought it meant reading the Bible, praying (of course, first confessing all my sins so that God would hear me), memorizing scripture, and generally “growing in the Word.” That’s another one I didn’t, and don’t, understand.

The thing is, all that personal relationship stuff is pretty easy to fake. It’s easy to memorize scripture. It’s easy to say you read the Bible and pray. It’s easy to appear like you and God are close. All you have to do is say the right words and do the right things in church. After all, who could possible know the truth about your personal relationship with God?

No one got very personal about my personl relationship with God. No one held me accountable in any way; not even my parents. We rarely read the Bible as a family. We prayed before eating but rarely any other time. There were no family devotions. It was a personal relationship which meant that is was, well, personal and not open for discussion.

The rub is works versus faith. Everyone knows that faith — believing in Jesus Christ — is what is important. (More ambiguous terminology to befuddle the mind.) Works don’t save you. But James says that there’s no better proof of your faith than works; without works your faith is dead (James 2:14-26). So, works don’t save you but without works you can’t be saved. So, it didn’t take me long to figure out that works could cover up a lot of unbelief and doubt and make my lack of faith look big.

And if a 12 year old can figure that out then I’m sure just about anyone can including the church deacon, the church pastor, the high-profile spiritual “leader”. So it should be pretty obvious that this opens up a huge can o’ worms. A personal relationship with God is intangible. Works are very tangible. Works “prove” the relationship. So, anyone — and I mean anyone — who wants to appear godly can appear godly.

The word pastor comes from the Latin word for shepherd. There are a lot of shepherds in the Bible. Jesus called himself “The Good Shepherd” and told a parable about a shepherd. Shepherds were there when Jesus was born. The 23rd Psalm says that “The Lord is my shepherd” and God calls himself a shepherd in Ezekiel. David was a shepherd before he killed Goliath and Abel (the “good” son) was a shepherd.

A shepherd takes care of the sheep. He leads them here and there to find food and water. He looks for the lost sheep and returns them to the fold. He puts his own life on the line for the sheep; defending them from the lion and the wolf. The shepherd knows his sheep; the sheep know their shepherd and will follow only him. The shepherd keeps his sheep and the goats separate; the sheep on the right, goats on the left.

The job of the pastor is, as you might expect from the etymology of the word, similar to that of the shepherd. He takes care of his sheep — i.e. his congregation. He leads them through the Bible to find nourishment and refreshment. He puts his metaphorical life on the line to protect them from the evil predators Satan, the humanist, and the religious pluralist. The pastor knows his sheep and they whole-heartedly — one may dare say blindly — follow him. He religiously affirms and reaffirms his congregation’s sheep-ness while pointing out the world’s goat-ness.

But there is another aspect which is often overlooked and which, I think, makes the metaphor that much more apt. Sheep are dumb. The Bible always describes sheep without a shepherd in a most negative way. They are “scattered” and “food for every beast” (Ezekiel 34:5), “wandering” and “afflicted” (Zechariah 10:2), “distressed and downcast” (Matthew 9:36). The sheep cannot survive on their own. They absolutely need a shepherd and are absolutely dependent on him. For he, and he alone, can feed them and save them from getting eaten alive. Now this dependence (dare I say addiction?) gives the pastor/shepherd a tremendous amount of authority over what his flock does and thinks. He decides what they eat and drink; he decides where they can go and can’t go; he is responsible for their complete wellbeing. They know his voice and follow no other. The shepherd basically has absolute power over his flock and we all know what absolute power does. If this sounds like I’m talking about Waco or Jonestown, I’m not — although these were extreme examples of what I am talking about. But the Koreshes and Joneses of the cult world aside, there is more coercion and manipulation in Sunday church in Anytown, USA, than one may think.

Ok, before you get all upset, I’m not talking about every pastor and every church and every congregation member. But, how often do you really think about what your pastor says? How often do you disagree with him/her? If you never do, let me suggest you think about this a little harder. Do you agree simply because you always agree with your pastor? Do you think it’s possible to always agree with someone — especially when it comes to religion? My wife and I have a lot in common but we don’t agree on everything.

I think a lot of people think they are thinking for themselves. They read the Bible and try to figure out what God is telling them. But many times they come up with exactly the same result as what their pastor preaches from the pulpit. Now, this may be construed as confirmation that they agree with their pastor. It may also be construed as “leading the witness”, coercion, or worse.