Congratulations on becoming a grandfather, and I wish your daughter and grandchild continued health and recovery. There is that “former Ivy League a-hole” part of me that wants to begin bloviating about liminal moments and spiritual reflection, but I just stuffed her in the closet with a gag in her mouth. I am tickled by your anecdote about asking to be excommunicated; incidentally I am a convert to Christianity who has never been baptized. And yes, Christianity absolutely “plagiarizes” Judaism insofar as a bunch of us who weren’t the OG chosen ones can agree with our Jewish brothers and sisters : “The Lord our God is one Lord/ And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.” The only reason I ever want to proselytize is because this thing— Christianity— and Jesus, the Jew whose story I choose to believe— make my life so much more infinitely joyful. The One God is known by the free will we experience to choose or reject him, which is why no true believer is offended by skepticism. Skepticism is human. Without skepticism belief is meaningless. After skepticism belief is pure joy.
I'll freely admit I was happier when I was more 'religious' - although I always struggled with the notion of The Trinity. I just couldn't make it make any kind of sense at all. I came to view Jesus as one of those individuals who arise with some kind of deeper 'connection' to the divine (whatever that is). Buddha is probably another individual like that.
But ultimately still human and no different to me or you. I think he was inviting us all to view ourselves as sons and daughters of God - and not to view himself as some kind of weird human/god hybrid.
The rational side of me tends to get the better of me when it comes to religion, as much as I'd like it to be true (well some of it at least), I also need it to make sense.
If you think about it, "...inviting us all to view ourselves as sons and daughters of God" is pretty much one more extension of the scientific view of reality. Buddha was a bit more 'democratic' than Jesus inasmuch other forms of life were tacitly invited, too.
Topic is religion, Abrahamic one? Don asbestos-suit. Time to rant:
Even most level-headed adherents of the god of Abraham (who sent bears to maul children to death, just because the children had taunted a prophet of his) soon start foaming at the mouth and become aggressive and abusive, when challenged even the slightest.
Such as:
Why do they wear clothes with mixed fabrics? That's an adomination.
Why don't they ever clamour for being punished according to scripture? Number of moslem, christian and jewish criminals who wants to adhere to scripture when it comes to stoning, cutting off limbs and beheadings stands at zero. But they do demand religious exemptions when it's to their advantage. There's a word for that.
Why do they ignore that 1st century BC was full of prophets clamouring about the One True Prophet for the One True God, and that the writings that's been edited to Hell and back by the church for 1500 years are simply what the papacy decided suited political purpose to keep in?
And how do they reconcile capitalism with Greed and Envy?
I meet the meek, kind and compassionate kind of ideal christian every week at the charity I volunteer for. Out of 30 people, about 3-5 will chastise you for whistling in church - why that's against the will of their god, they cannot explain, it's just "bad". The same group demand that they be allowed to vet any books, films, and clothing donated to see that it is appropriate - and their line in the sand goes at children's movies that doesn't have a christian focus, anything more secular is called satanic.
Their argument is: they have a right to decide for others "what's good for them".
Meanwhile, the moslem women who are among the needy insist on shaking hands and saying thanks every time they receive something - but their men? They refuse to enter premises, instead standing guard outside.
Last time I worked with a jewish colleague, I asked him why the jews deserve a homeland when no-one is giving territory to the gypsies. He got very angry, but the sum total was: the jews are owed for crimes in the past (as if the gypsies couldn't claim that - until the 16th century gypsies were to be killed on the spot, by anyone, if caught in Sweden or Denmark) and they are god's people, so other people must respect them, respect here used in the arabic-semitic meaning: deference, obeisance and acquiescence. Not an attitude designed to net you friends, is it.
I simply use the same language about judaism and its offspring, that said cults have always used against non-Abrahamic schools of thought - do unto others, you know.
Half-joking aside, I don't mind religion nor do I mind people having a faith or a creed they live by, provided they don't force it onto others, respect people's right to opt out of the cult when they want to, and such things.
Which honestly only is a problem with jews, some christians, and virtually all moslems.
The wokist Karen effect you speak of seems to be a persistent theme in relatively recent (since start of Neolithic) human history. A real weed of a human tendency.
"Would the world be better or worse off if Christianity hadn’t happened? What about the same question applied to Islam?”
Would it be better off without the earlier Greek work called the Penteteuch? Why does Judaism get a pass in this screed of yours? FYI the Penteteuch/Torah is based on earlier Greek works. And was written by Greeks who were trying to raise a more obedient populace. Much the same as Christianity or Islam. In fact taking them in isolation is just wrong.
OK - just for your benefit - would the world be better or worse off if Judaism hadn't happened?
Could you have not inferred this as a question yourself?
Most of my reading was about trying to understand Jesus within the context of 1st century Judaism and about trying to understand what Islam was about. I'm aware that there's some possibility of the Written Torah (i.e. the Pentateuch) having been influenced by Greek myths. I find some of the attempted parallels between the first 5 books of the OT and Greek myths to be a bit of a stretch, whilst others are more interesting. I think it's fair to say that some of it was probably influenced by Greek myth.
Of course you can't properly take them all in isolation. It was intended to be a hypothetical question to encourage a kind of cost/benefit analysis of each religion. Has Judaism/Christianity/Islam been a net positive or a net negative for the world?
Net negative in my view. We’d have been better off keeping the 12 Olympian gods as they were more closely tied to the elements.
The Ancient Israel story is an invention, it never existed as a nation in the Greek world or the Assyrian world. Or before/alongside that in the Egyptian and Persian worlds. It never features when you study the Classics because it never appears in any Classical Greek work. That’s because it's an anachronistic boy. It’s based on Athens, maybe somewhat on Samos. Installed after Alexander, long after. Many previous efforts at religion installation had failed (that story is repeated in the Roman installation of Christianity) because far too rubbish (a bull ffs). Israel though is a philosophical idea tied to its twin Aaron, who has since beeen sidelined (because too much complexity), rather than being a country in the Levant (a somewhat anachronistic term here but a good guideline to where we are talking about).
Congratulations on your new granddaughter and glad she's is doing ok now. My latest was 11 weeks premature by emergency caesarean, so I've experienced such a scare. It was a horrible first few months but she's just awesome now.
Thanks Chi, and glad it all worked for you on the baby front too. It is, as you say, horrible - and I'm only the grandpa thing. Mum's worry must have been on another level.
I think the questions surrounding religion are fascinating. I can't entirely divorce my scientific perspective from it all, but I'm also aware that science doesn't give us all the 'answers' - far from it.
Congrats on becoming a grandparent! We welcomed our first just over a year ago and yes, we are besotted! But I digress…
Unfortunately, it would seem that very early on in the article, you have tripped over the very first and arguably the most important hurdle, with the claim that Jesus never claimed to be Divine.
Please re-read the Gospel of John. The designation “I Am”, referenced by Jesus multiple times, was a very specific Jewish reference to a claim of Divinity. Which is why the Jewish religious leaders were so furious with Jesus. They understood exactly what he was claiming and for them it was blasphemy. Except that the miracles Jesus performed (as recorded by John), were explicitly designed to authenticate the claim.
Which leads to C.S.Lewis’ famous dictum that Jesus was either a Liar, a Lunatic or Lord. And as a general rule people don’t usually die for liars and lunatics, especially 2000 years after the fact.
Of course, nobody has to accept Jesus’ claim to Divinity, but to state that Jesus never claimed Divinity is a major categorical error that renders the rest of the essay somewhat problematic.
Yes - that's pretty much the standard view of things I learned as I was growing up. I always found it interesting that John's Jesus was a little bit different to the Jesus of the synoptics. John's gospel is also quite different in style and emphasis.
The books of Vermes are really good, because they tackle these kinds of questions from a Jewish perspective without outright dismissal. There are different ways to interpret all of the supposed 'divinity' statements of Jesus.
You've then also got to figure out whether the translation from the Aramaic that he spoke is giving us the understanding that his listeners at the time would have formed.
You've also got the question of all of the other gospels that didn't get admitted into the canon. For some of them, it's easy to understand why. The gospel of Thomas is probably the most fascinating and important of these.
I don't think the fanaticism or willingness to be martyrs of the followers tells us anything about the veracity, or otherwise, of what they believe in. If that were the case we'd be more interested in Islam perhaps?
No idea who the guy is, so did some research. Yeah, I know - dangerous. But as a Jewish scholar, Vermes has done a lot of useful work researching and exploring Jesus - the Jewish man. IMHO, this is a very good thing, as it brings a layer of cultural context that greatly enhances our understanding of the Gospels.
However, Vermes does admit that many of his views on the veracity and accuracy of the four Gospels are at odds with a majority of modern day New Testament scholarship. Perhaps understandable, as the concept of a Jewish “holy man” proclaiming to be the “Son of the Father”, i.e. Divine, is as grossly offensive to modern Judaism as it was in the first century AD.
Yet we see Matthew in his gospel account, writing to a predominantly Jewish audience, recording that the High Priest was so upset at Jesus’ proclamation of Deity, that he tore his clothes in protest (Matt 26:65). Blasphemy!
On the other hand, as you identify, the Gospel of John is different.
John’s stated aim in writing the book was, “so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing you may have life in His name.”
He was writing to a not-so-Jewish audience, thus there are many side references to explain cultural nuances (see Jn 1:28 & 38 for examples). However, the book does contain specific Jewish idioms like the aforementioned “I Am”, that every good Jew understood as a reference to Deity. Jesus provocatively uses the phrase for himself seven times. “I Am the Way, the Truth, the Life” etc.
This is John’s personal account where he testifies to the many occasions when he witnessed Christ not only affirming his Deity, but authenticating it through a special class of miracles, which in Jewish thought could only come from a Divine source.
While John certainly spoke Aramaic, he was most likely fluent in Greek, the common language of the day. A language that is extremely precise in its structure and syntax. Furthermore, the earliest fragments of John’s Gospel are in Greek and date to c125 AD.
Thus it defies credulity to suggest that what John originally wrote and what we now have is an unfortunate misunderstanding due to translation issues.
That’s a lot of very specific, “I Am God, what don’t you understand” language to mistranslate (or misconstrue). Where is the ancient textual evidence to support this contention? Or is it just scholarly speculation from someone who really, really doesn’t want it to be true? In that case, why bother? Who cares?
The probable early date of writing also defies accusations of fabrication. People were still alive to call out any false narrative. It is curious that none of the Gospels mention the destruction of the Temple in AD70.
But why perpetuate a lie this big anyway? Where’s the gain?
Accordingly to the Gospel accounts, Jesus’ actions and words - especially those that claimed and authenticated his Divinity - thoroughly pissed off the Jewish religious leaders. I mean seriously annoyed. Jesus was way past being a very naughty boy. They wanted Him dead. On a cross. A presumably failed false-messiah, with a ragtag bunch of seriously scared followers that immediately fled into hiding at the first sign of trouble. Losers.
Doesn’t seem like a smart story-telling strategy if you’re trying to win your fellow countrymen over to a new religious sect.
Unless of course, you’re telling the truth. About a grand miracle of One Life overcoming death. And you emerge from hiding to take this Gospel, this message of ‘good news’ to the entire world.
Even if it costs you your life.
P.S. I am remiss for not earlier expressing a modicum of compassion around the events surrounding your grandchild’s birth. I can imagine how distressing that must have been and are thankful for you and your family that there is an improvement in circumstances and pray that continues. Watching a grandchild grow and develop is truly a joy and a blessing! Some would even add, “from the Lord”. 😊
Vermes was really good. I've forgotten most of the details. It's some years since I was full-on interested in this stuff. Sanders was another excellent writer on these issues and he has a very different (and to my mind, more plausible) take on why Jesus was executed.
I remember coming to the conclusion that John's gospel was written to counter the rise of what might loosely be termed 'gnostic' Christianity - particularly the Thomas (The Twin) followers. I can't properly remember my reasoning behind that now.
The squabbles between Peter and Paul after Jesus' death are also very interesting because they point to a very different understanding of who Jesus was and what his mission was between the two camps. As we know, the Pauline version is the one that won out. Fascinatingly it is likely that James, Jesus' brother, was the first head of the Jerusalem 'church', and not Peter.
The real difficulty with it all is the relative paucity of material we can be sure about. How much of the gospels we see are edited accounts adapted to convey a message, and how much can we rely upon to be an accurate re-telling of what happened and what was said?
John's gospel contains a lot of long passages from Jesus presenting quite a different character to the Jesus of the synoptics. I find it hard to believe these are direct word for word quotes.
We really can't ignore the issue of translation either. I come back to the question as to what those hearing Jesus would have understood? I very much doubt they'd have heard the same message that we 2,000 years later do.
Squabbles between Paul and Peter? Please do tell… But yes they had two different missions. The NT tells us that. Paul to be an apostle to the wider Gentile world beyond the Levant, and Peter to the local Jews and believers in Israel. Different crowd, same message.
I agree that James, the brother of Jesus became head of the church in Jerusalem - his letter is considered one of the earliest written NT books, if not the earliest.
As to the relatively paucity of material… Lol. Next you’ll be telling me that Covid jabs are safe and effective and gravity isn’t a thing. There are over 5500 ancient Greek manuscripts, dating from the 2nd century, with an internal consistency of 99.5%. No other ancient text comes close. The runner up is Homer’s Iliad with about 640 copies. Caesar’s History - 10. Plato - 7. So, if one wants to take the position that we can’t have confidence in knowing what the original documents of the NT said, they better reject the rest of ancient writings as well. Of course, whether one accepts the truth of the NT narratives is another question altogether.
Finally, modern scholarship has revealed much about the language, culture and idioms of first century Israel, thus I think we can have reasonable confidence to understand the NT if we’re sufficiently interested. Granted, many aren’t, but I think it’s pretty clear that the original hearers of Jesus words understood most of what he said, especially when he challenged the religious leadership. Pretty sure viper and white sepulchre mean the same today! Jesus hearers either loved it or hated it. Jesus stepped on religious toes back then and is doing so today. At least that seems pretty obvious to me. Jesus himself said he would be a stumbling stone to many. Doesn’t take a degree in Philology to work that one out! 🤓
P.S. Btw, this is the central challenge of Christianity. Who IS Jesus? And if he is who he claimed to be and did what is recorded in the New Testament (not to mention the fulfilment of prophecy in the Hebrew Scriptures), how do we respond to that? Our future eternity rests on it…
Speaking of your "Appropriation and Misappropriation", I'm reminded of a passage from James Frazer's The Golden Bough, not that I read much more than the foreword or preface. But something to the effect that good people will use religion to good ends, and bad people to bad ones.
I was raised by a devout Episcopal Mom. Dad would drop 5 kids off at church and drive away - I wondered what was going on with him!! As I grew up, I started to question the Bible. Written by “man” interpreting the word of God, so I knew it was distorted. Church is more rules by man, and after the Catholic priest disaster, I lost respect. In the sunset of my life, I’m still a true believer in God. But I firmly believe religion helped build the foundation for my family’s morals and values. What I fear are extremists, no matter what religion.
Yeah. As you can tell from the piece, I struggle with the rational basis for it all, but also can't deny that religion has provided a basis for lots of good too.
Whether we'd have got to the same place, morally speaking, without religion is an interesting question I think.
Lovely column! "Would the world be better or worse off if Christianity hadn’t happened?" Some would argue much worse off without the economic influence of, in particular, Protestant beliefs. I find this fascinating. It is interestingly discussed in two classic books I have re-read several times: Max Weber's, 'The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism,' (why Calvinism at its most rigid was and is a good thing) and "Religion and the rise of capitalism : A historical study' by R. H. Tawney, in which the socialist who remained a Christian describes why he was peeved by Weber and by certain aspects of Christianity. Both worth the time.
Are most religious folk ignoramus? Yes. Are most religions suspect? Yes. Do most believer's have a grossly incorrect image of God in their minds? Yes. If the Bible is true, it's already essentially agreed with you on these points: "But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it." - Matthew 7:14. To your point that you've examined the religious field and it's mostly a disaster, I'd say so what? Only one answer needs to be right, so who cares about what the big picture looks like?
Maybe the least impressive part of article, to me, is you blast all the systems that might provide a moral foundation, then you don't provide any moral foundation of your own; you just arbitrarily cherry pick X, Y and Z from those systems.
"A God that would do that is evil!"... By what standard? How do you define good or bad? Why should I care about how you've defined it? I think Islam is absolutely wicked, but at least those guys have a basis for defining terms, unlike you.
I don't have any easy way to provide a moral foundation outside of religion. The universe, from a strictly scientific perspective, doesn't give a shit about our morals. But are our codes of conduct, our ethics, just human constructs, or do they, ultimately, derive from a divine being?
But it's probably a good idea we have some kind of societal restriction on things like murder and theft and the like. The codes of conduct we generally accept as 'good' do not have to have derived from religion but from more utilitarian considerations.
I didn't blast all of them - and didn't do much of a 'blasting' of those anyway. There are plenty more religions to choose from other than the Abrahamic 3. I quite like Buddhism, for example. He seemed like a dude that was just as cool as that Jesus dude.
Personally I find the notion of the 'torturer God' to be a little sick. You might not and think He's doing a good thing by turning unbelievers into crispy critters for all eternity. Fair enough - whatever lights your candle, or your hellfire, I suppose.
And one of the purposes of the piece was to reflect on the benefits religion has brought. The moral codes we have lived by for centuries (although not properly applied very often until recently) seem to have been a great benefit. It's where we get our sense of morality from. But could that have arisen in the absence of religion? I don't know.
That morals only exist due to us humans makes them more important, not less, than if they'd been ordained by some deity.
Also, a person who needs an authority to tell them upon pain of death and eternal torture that (f.e.) murder is wrong, has no moral or ethics of their own, all they have is a conditioned response to a possible painful experience.
This is what the pomos got wrong on morality: that it being manmade and arbitrary means it lacks value. It is the opposite, as mentioned.
And without a god to point to and blame for one's actions, all actions taken are on you, due to your will and therefore the full responsibility is yours too. That right there is why most people want an Authority to tell them right, wrong and how to rationalise their will into the will of the authority.
If that auhtority is called the prophet, the führer, the intersectional whatthefudgery or Jose the fractal flea who dwells at right angles to the speed of light is irrelevant to the human brain. The ability to to point to X and say: "I was only following orders/commandments/hadith/whatever" is extremely liberating.
"That morals only exist due to us humans makes them more important, not less, than if they'd been ordained by some deity."
If an eternal, perfect, unchanging, omniscient God defines the moral system that is LESS important than if some meat creatures that emerged from the ooze on a giant rock define a constantly changing series of moral systems? Why? As we all know, the meat creatures moral system changes every day, often based largely on the corruption of those in power and if we were to look at the morality of humanity over the last 6,000+ years, almost all of us today would find huge amounts of it to be absolutely disgusting. I'd love to hear why man's moral system is theoretically more important than God's.
'No finite point has meaning without an infinite reference point.' -Jean-Paul Sartre
I don't see how you get around this. I agree that it's, "probably good we have some kind of societal restriction on things like murder and theft", but if we are operating in a context where an eternal reference point (God) has been removed from the equation, these restrictions are just meaningless, arbitrary personal preference.
If codes of conduct are arbitrary, aren't tied to an eternal reference point and can be derived from utilitarian considerations like you suggest, I don't see why 'torturer God' is distasteful for you. God's punishment is utilitarian for Him; to display the full range of His characteristics and to glorify Himself through His righteous wrath.
Personally, I'd have a hard time being smart guy like yourself, being able to see as much of the picture as you do and for my personal moral systematic to be based off of quasi-utilitarianism and personal "ick" factor. I think you are straddling the fence on a dud position. The consistent position is to either embrace the meaningless of it all (as many do) or find the eternal reference point. Personally, I'm putting all my eggs in the Jesus basket and we'll see how it works out. Just my two cents.
"these restrictions are just meaningless, arbitrary personal preference"
Not at all. They're not arbitrary and may well have some evolutionary component. Once you've formed some kind of society, that society will have to work harmoniously together otherwise it will fail.
I think the assertion that 'no God' = arbitrary is wrong. It's a false dichotomy.
What standard, that exists outside of our minds, can you point to that says societal harmony is objectively better than societal chaos? I agree we can inuit it at some level, but intuition is not objective.
How does a big bang and the proceeding chaos of billions of years of ruthless death ever result in any kind of objective moral system? If group X survives 10 years and group Y survives 1,000 years, in this godless system, what do you point to that exists outside of your mind, to say "Group Y's moral system is objectively better than X's"? Why is survival ever objectively "better" than death? Its impossible to objectively define "better" in that system.
If there is a logical, consistent answer to these questions to be given, I've never heard it.
There is no such standard. But neither is there an objective standard to determine which of the various Gods and religions are 'better' than others, either. For that we must rely on our own (arbitrary?) human judgement.
When you come to the conclusion that Christianity represents the truth and is 'better' than all the other religions, what objective standard are you using to come to that conclusion?
I'm a Calvinist. If my systematic theology is correct (I don't expect you to grant me that it is), God generates faith in us and it's not a matter of human judgement. There is no way for me to objectively demonstrate that I've made the correct decision.
My point is that I know you want to be consistent as a general rule (so do I) and I think you've left the playing field entirely for what allows for a consistent position. You want objective morality and when someone steals your wallet, you intuit that it exists but then I think you also agree that in your godless worldview it more or less can't possibly exist. If you've accepted that your worldview can't possibly provide an objective moral standard, then your commentary on how good or bad you think God is isn't worth much. It's just emoting.
I think you grant that theism can at least theoretically provide an objective standard for morality. I don't think you can even theoretically come up with a way that a godless world would generate an objective moral system.
Congratulations on becoming a grandfather, and I wish your daughter and grandchild continued health and recovery. There is that “former Ivy League a-hole” part of me that wants to begin bloviating about liminal moments and spiritual reflection, but I just stuffed her in the closet with a gag in her mouth. I am tickled by your anecdote about asking to be excommunicated; incidentally I am a convert to Christianity who has never been baptized. And yes, Christianity absolutely “plagiarizes” Judaism insofar as a bunch of us who weren’t the OG chosen ones can agree with our Jewish brothers and sisters : “The Lord our God is one Lord/ And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.” The only reason I ever want to proselytize is because this thing— Christianity— and Jesus, the Jew whose story I choose to believe— make my life so much more infinitely joyful. The One God is known by the free will we experience to choose or reject him, which is why no true believer is offended by skepticism. Skepticism is human. Without skepticism belief is meaningless. After skepticism belief is pure joy.
Thanks for the wishes Diana
I'll freely admit I was happier when I was more 'religious' - although I always struggled with the notion of The Trinity. I just couldn't make it make any kind of sense at all. I came to view Jesus as one of those individuals who arise with some kind of deeper 'connection' to the divine (whatever that is). Buddha is probably another individual like that.
But ultimately still human and no different to me or you. I think he was inviting us all to view ourselves as sons and daughters of God - and not to view himself as some kind of weird human/god hybrid.
The rational side of me tends to get the better of me when it comes to religion, as much as I'd like it to be true (well some of it at least), I also need it to make sense.
If you think about it, "...inviting us all to view ourselves as sons and daughters of God" is pretty much one more extension of the scientific view of reality. Buddha was a bit more 'democratic' than Jesus inasmuch other forms of life were tacitly invited, too.
Topic is religion, Abrahamic one? Don asbestos-suit. Time to rant:
Even most level-headed adherents of the god of Abraham (who sent bears to maul children to death, just because the children had taunted a prophet of his) soon start foaming at the mouth and become aggressive and abusive, when challenged even the slightest.
Such as:
Why do they wear clothes with mixed fabrics? That's an adomination.
Why don't they ever clamour for being punished according to scripture? Number of moslem, christian and jewish criminals who wants to adhere to scripture when it comes to stoning, cutting off limbs and beheadings stands at zero. But they do demand religious exemptions when it's to their advantage. There's a word for that.
Why do they ignore that 1st century BC was full of prophets clamouring about the One True Prophet for the One True God, and that the writings that's been edited to Hell and back by the church for 1500 years are simply what the papacy decided suited political purpose to keep in?
And how do they reconcile capitalism with Greed and Envy?
I meet the meek, kind and compassionate kind of ideal christian every week at the charity I volunteer for. Out of 30 people, about 3-5 will chastise you for whistling in church - why that's against the will of their god, they cannot explain, it's just "bad". The same group demand that they be allowed to vet any books, films, and clothing donated to see that it is appropriate - and their line in the sand goes at children's movies that doesn't have a christian focus, anything more secular is called satanic.
Their argument is: they have a right to decide for others "what's good for them".
Meanwhile, the moslem women who are among the needy insist on shaking hands and saying thanks every time they receive something - but their men? They refuse to enter premises, instead standing guard outside.
Last time I worked with a jewish colleague, I asked him why the jews deserve a homeland when no-one is giving territory to the gypsies. He got very angry, but the sum total was: the jews are owed for crimes in the past (as if the gypsies couldn't claim that - until the 16th century gypsies were to be killed on the spot, by anyone, if caught in Sweden or Denmark) and they are god's people, so other people must respect them, respect here used in the arabic-semitic meaning: deference, obeisance and acquiescence. Not an attitude designed to net you friends, is it.
No, give me real gods any day.
And I wake up to one of Rikard's comments
Always a breath of Swedish (hot) fresh air perhaps? 😊
Whilst I would probably shy away from phrasing some of this as you do, there's more than a smidgeon of well-chosen pithiness here to ponder.
Sorry? :)
I simply use the same language about judaism and its offspring, that said cults have always used against non-Abrahamic schools of thought - do unto others, you know.
Half-joking aside, I don't mind religion nor do I mind people having a faith or a creed they live by, provided they don't force it onto others, respect people's right to opt out of the cult when they want to, and such things.
Which honestly only is a problem with jews, some christians, and virtually all moslems.
The wokist Karen effect you speak of seems to be a persistent theme in relatively recent (since start of Neolithic) human history. A real weed of a human tendency.
"Would the world be better or worse off if Christianity hadn’t happened? What about the same question applied to Islam?”
Would it be better off without the earlier Greek work called the Penteteuch? Why does Judaism get a pass in this screed of yours? FYI the Penteteuch/Torah is based on earlier Greek works. And was written by Greeks who were trying to raise a more obedient populace. Much the same as Christianity or Islam. In fact taking them in isolation is just wrong.
OK - just for your benefit - would the world be better or worse off if Judaism hadn't happened?
Could you have not inferred this as a question yourself?
Most of my reading was about trying to understand Jesus within the context of 1st century Judaism and about trying to understand what Islam was about. I'm aware that there's some possibility of the Written Torah (i.e. the Pentateuch) having been influenced by Greek myths. I find some of the attempted parallels between the first 5 books of the OT and Greek myths to be a bit of a stretch, whilst others are more interesting. I think it's fair to say that some of it was probably influenced by Greek myth.
Of course you can't properly take them all in isolation. It was intended to be a hypothetical question to encourage a kind of cost/benefit analysis of each religion. Has Judaism/Christianity/Islam been a net positive or a net negative for the world?
Net negative in my view. We’d have been better off keeping the 12 Olympian gods as they were more closely tied to the elements.
The Ancient Israel story is an invention, it never existed as a nation in the Greek world or the Assyrian world. Or before/alongside that in the Egyptian and Persian worlds. It never features when you study the Classics because it never appears in any Classical Greek work. That’s because it's an anachronistic boy. It’s based on Athens, maybe somewhat on Samos. Installed after Alexander, long after. Many previous efforts at religion installation had failed (that story is repeated in the Roman installation of Christianity) because far too rubbish (a bull ffs). Israel though is a philosophical idea tied to its twin Aaron, who has since beeen sidelined (because too much complexity), rather than being a country in the Levant (a somewhat anachronistic term here but a good guideline to where we are talking about).
The characters, and the history, are all Greek. Redone.
BTW one last thing, Jesus is Apollo and he was resurrected at Nicaea in 325 CE.
Apollo Christ has even less of a ring to it than Joshua Christ 🤣
Apollo's Creed? Didn't Rocky fight him?
That's how it easy it is to come up with religion: free association of names and images.
It’s Iasos Chrestus. Which means “the gold of Iasos”.
Stimulating piece. Thanks.
You might find this interesting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tTe28mdi25Y
Congratulations on your new granddaughter and glad she's is doing ok now. My latest was 11 weeks premature by emergency caesarean, so I've experienced such a scare. It was a horrible first few months but she's just awesome now.
Thanks Chi, and glad it all worked for you on the baby front too. It is, as you say, horrible - and I'm only the grandpa thing. Mum's worry must have been on another level.
I think the questions surrounding religion are fascinating. I can't entirely divorce my scientific perspective from it all, but I'm also aware that science doesn't give us all the 'answers' - far from it.
Congrats on becoming a grandparent! We welcomed our first just over a year ago and yes, we are besotted! But I digress…
Unfortunately, it would seem that very early on in the article, you have tripped over the very first and arguably the most important hurdle, with the claim that Jesus never claimed to be Divine.
Please re-read the Gospel of John. The designation “I Am”, referenced by Jesus multiple times, was a very specific Jewish reference to a claim of Divinity. Which is why the Jewish religious leaders were so furious with Jesus. They understood exactly what he was claiming and for them it was blasphemy. Except that the miracles Jesus performed (as recorded by John), were explicitly designed to authenticate the claim.
Which leads to C.S.Lewis’ famous dictum that Jesus was either a Liar, a Lunatic or Lord. And as a general rule people don’t usually die for liars and lunatics, especially 2000 years after the fact.
Of course, nobody has to accept Jesus’ claim to Divinity, but to state that Jesus never claimed Divinity is a major categorical error that renders the rest of the essay somewhat problematic.
Peace! 😊
Thanks for the congrats Steve
Yes - that's pretty much the standard view of things I learned as I was growing up. I always found it interesting that John's Jesus was a little bit different to the Jesus of the synoptics. John's gospel is also quite different in style and emphasis.
The books of Vermes are really good, because they tackle these kinds of questions from a Jewish perspective without outright dismissal. There are different ways to interpret all of the supposed 'divinity' statements of Jesus.
You've then also got to figure out whether the translation from the Aramaic that he spoke is giving us the understanding that his listeners at the time would have formed.
You've also got the question of all of the other gospels that didn't get admitted into the canon. For some of them, it's easy to understand why. The gospel of Thomas is probably the most fascinating and important of these.
I don't think the fanaticism or willingness to be martyrs of the followers tells us anything about the veracity, or otherwise, of what they believe in. If that were the case we'd be more interested in Islam perhaps?
Ah yes, Vermes.
No idea who the guy is, so did some research. Yeah, I know - dangerous. But as a Jewish scholar, Vermes has done a lot of useful work researching and exploring Jesus - the Jewish man. IMHO, this is a very good thing, as it brings a layer of cultural context that greatly enhances our understanding of the Gospels.
However, Vermes does admit that many of his views on the veracity and accuracy of the four Gospels are at odds with a majority of modern day New Testament scholarship. Perhaps understandable, as the concept of a Jewish “holy man” proclaiming to be the “Son of the Father”, i.e. Divine, is as grossly offensive to modern Judaism as it was in the first century AD.
Yet we see Matthew in his gospel account, writing to a predominantly Jewish audience, recording that the High Priest was so upset at Jesus’ proclamation of Deity, that he tore his clothes in protest (Matt 26:65). Blasphemy!
On the other hand, as you identify, the Gospel of John is different.
John’s stated aim in writing the book was, “so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing you may have life in His name.”
He was writing to a not-so-Jewish audience, thus there are many side references to explain cultural nuances (see Jn 1:28 & 38 for examples). However, the book does contain specific Jewish idioms like the aforementioned “I Am”, that every good Jew understood as a reference to Deity. Jesus provocatively uses the phrase for himself seven times. “I Am the Way, the Truth, the Life” etc.
This is John’s personal account where he testifies to the many occasions when he witnessed Christ not only affirming his Deity, but authenticating it through a special class of miracles, which in Jewish thought could only come from a Divine source.
While John certainly spoke Aramaic, he was most likely fluent in Greek, the common language of the day. A language that is extremely precise in its structure and syntax. Furthermore, the earliest fragments of John’s Gospel are in Greek and date to c125 AD.
Thus it defies credulity to suggest that what John originally wrote and what we now have is an unfortunate misunderstanding due to translation issues.
That’s a lot of very specific, “I Am God, what don’t you understand” language to mistranslate (or misconstrue). Where is the ancient textual evidence to support this contention? Or is it just scholarly speculation from someone who really, really doesn’t want it to be true? In that case, why bother? Who cares?
The probable early date of writing also defies accusations of fabrication. People were still alive to call out any false narrative. It is curious that none of the Gospels mention the destruction of the Temple in AD70.
But why perpetuate a lie this big anyway? Where’s the gain?
Accordingly to the Gospel accounts, Jesus’ actions and words - especially those that claimed and authenticated his Divinity - thoroughly pissed off the Jewish religious leaders. I mean seriously annoyed. Jesus was way past being a very naughty boy. They wanted Him dead. On a cross. A presumably failed false-messiah, with a ragtag bunch of seriously scared followers that immediately fled into hiding at the first sign of trouble. Losers.
Doesn’t seem like a smart story-telling strategy if you’re trying to win your fellow countrymen over to a new religious sect.
Unless of course, you’re telling the truth. About a grand miracle of One Life overcoming death. And you emerge from hiding to take this Gospel, this message of ‘good news’ to the entire world.
Even if it costs you your life.
P.S. I am remiss for not earlier expressing a modicum of compassion around the events surrounding your grandchild’s birth. I can imagine how distressing that must have been and are thankful for you and your family that there is an improvement in circumstances and pray that continues. Watching a grandchild grow and develop is truly a joy and a blessing! Some would even add, “from the Lord”. 😊
Vermes was really good. I've forgotten most of the details. It's some years since I was full-on interested in this stuff. Sanders was another excellent writer on these issues and he has a very different (and to my mind, more plausible) take on why Jesus was executed.
I remember coming to the conclusion that John's gospel was written to counter the rise of what might loosely be termed 'gnostic' Christianity - particularly the Thomas (The Twin) followers. I can't properly remember my reasoning behind that now.
The squabbles between Peter and Paul after Jesus' death are also very interesting because they point to a very different understanding of who Jesus was and what his mission was between the two camps. As we know, the Pauline version is the one that won out. Fascinatingly it is likely that James, Jesus' brother, was the first head of the Jerusalem 'church', and not Peter.
The real difficulty with it all is the relative paucity of material we can be sure about. How much of the gospels we see are edited accounts adapted to convey a message, and how much can we rely upon to be an accurate re-telling of what happened and what was said?
John's gospel contains a lot of long passages from Jesus presenting quite a different character to the Jesus of the synoptics. I find it hard to believe these are direct word for word quotes.
We really can't ignore the issue of translation either. I come back to the question as to what those hearing Jesus would have understood? I very much doubt they'd have heard the same message that we 2,000 years later do.
Squabbles between Paul and Peter? Please do tell… But yes they had two different missions. The NT tells us that. Paul to be an apostle to the wider Gentile world beyond the Levant, and Peter to the local Jews and believers in Israel. Different crowd, same message.
I agree that James, the brother of Jesus became head of the church in Jerusalem - his letter is considered one of the earliest written NT books, if not the earliest.
As to the relatively paucity of material… Lol. Next you’ll be telling me that Covid jabs are safe and effective and gravity isn’t a thing. There are over 5500 ancient Greek manuscripts, dating from the 2nd century, with an internal consistency of 99.5%. No other ancient text comes close. The runner up is Homer’s Iliad with about 640 copies. Caesar’s History - 10. Plato - 7. So, if one wants to take the position that we can’t have confidence in knowing what the original documents of the NT said, they better reject the rest of ancient writings as well. Of course, whether one accepts the truth of the NT narratives is another question altogether.
Finally, modern scholarship has revealed much about the language, culture and idioms of first century Israel, thus I think we can have reasonable confidence to understand the NT if we’re sufficiently interested. Granted, many aren’t, but I think it’s pretty clear that the original hearers of Jesus words understood most of what he said, especially when he challenged the religious leadership. Pretty sure viper and white sepulchre mean the same today! Jesus hearers either loved it or hated it. Jesus stepped on religious toes back then and is doing so today. At least that seems pretty obvious to me. Jesus himself said he would be a stumbling stone to many. Doesn’t take a degree in Philology to work that one out! 🤓
P.S. Btw, this is the central challenge of Christianity. Who IS Jesus? And if he is who he claimed to be and did what is recorded in the New Testament (not to mention the fulfilment of prophecy in the Hebrew Scriptures), how do we respond to that? Our future eternity rests on it…
Speaking of your "Appropriation and Misappropriation", I'm reminded of a passage from James Frazer's The Golden Bough, not that I read much more than the foreword or preface. But something to the effect that good people will use religion to good ends, and bad people to bad ones.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Golden_Bough
Often difficult to tell the difference without a score card ... 😉🙂
I was raised by a devout Episcopal Mom. Dad would drop 5 kids off at church and drive away - I wondered what was going on with him!! As I grew up, I started to question the Bible. Written by “man” interpreting the word of God, so I knew it was distorted. Church is more rules by man, and after the Catholic priest disaster, I lost respect. In the sunset of my life, I’m still a true believer in God. But I firmly believe religion helped build the foundation for my family’s morals and values. What I fear are extremists, no matter what religion.
Yeah. As you can tell from the piece, I struggle with the rational basis for it all, but also can't deny that religion has provided a basis for lots of good too.
Whether we'd have got to the same place, morally speaking, without religion is an interesting question I think.
Lovely column! "Would the world be better or worse off if Christianity hadn’t happened?" Some would argue much worse off without the economic influence of, in particular, Protestant beliefs. I find this fascinating. It is interestingly discussed in two classic books I have re-read several times: Max Weber's, 'The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism,' (why Calvinism at its most rigid was and is a good thing) and "Religion and the rise of capitalism : A historical study' by R. H. Tawney, in which the socialist who remained a Christian describes why he was peeved by Weber and by certain aspects of Christianity. Both worth the time.
Congrats on your grandchild 😊
Thanks David - she's a bit of a miracle. She wasn't expected to survive, but she did.
Are most religious folk ignoramus? Yes. Are most religions suspect? Yes. Do most believer's have a grossly incorrect image of God in their minds? Yes. If the Bible is true, it's already essentially agreed with you on these points: "But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it." - Matthew 7:14. To your point that you've examined the religious field and it's mostly a disaster, I'd say so what? Only one answer needs to be right, so who cares about what the big picture looks like?
Maybe the least impressive part of article, to me, is you blast all the systems that might provide a moral foundation, then you don't provide any moral foundation of your own; you just arbitrarily cherry pick X, Y and Z from those systems.
"A God that would do that is evil!"... By what standard? How do you define good or bad? Why should I care about how you've defined it? I think Islam is absolutely wicked, but at least those guys have a basis for defining terms, unlike you.
I don't have any easy way to provide a moral foundation outside of religion. The universe, from a strictly scientific perspective, doesn't give a shit about our morals. But are our codes of conduct, our ethics, just human constructs, or do they, ultimately, derive from a divine being?
But it's probably a good idea we have some kind of societal restriction on things like murder and theft and the like. The codes of conduct we generally accept as 'good' do not have to have derived from religion but from more utilitarian considerations.
I didn't blast all of them - and didn't do much of a 'blasting' of those anyway. There are plenty more religions to choose from other than the Abrahamic 3. I quite like Buddhism, for example. He seemed like a dude that was just as cool as that Jesus dude.
Personally I find the notion of the 'torturer God' to be a little sick. You might not and think He's doing a good thing by turning unbelievers into crispy critters for all eternity. Fair enough - whatever lights your candle, or your hellfire, I suppose.
And one of the purposes of the piece was to reflect on the benefits religion has brought. The moral codes we have lived by for centuries (although not properly applied very often until recently) seem to have been a great benefit. It's where we get our sense of morality from. But could that have arisen in the absence of religion? I don't know.
That morals only exist due to us humans makes them more important, not less, than if they'd been ordained by some deity.
Also, a person who needs an authority to tell them upon pain of death and eternal torture that (f.e.) murder is wrong, has no moral or ethics of their own, all they have is a conditioned response to a possible painful experience.
This is what the pomos got wrong on morality: that it being manmade and arbitrary means it lacks value. It is the opposite, as mentioned.
And without a god to point to and blame for one's actions, all actions taken are on you, due to your will and therefore the full responsibility is yours too. That right there is why most people want an Authority to tell them right, wrong and how to rationalise their will into the will of the authority.
If that auhtority is called the prophet, the führer, the intersectional whatthefudgery or Jose the fractal flea who dwells at right angles to the speed of light is irrelevant to the human brain. The ability to to point to X and say: "I was only following orders/commandments/hadith/whatever" is extremely liberating.
"That morals only exist due to us humans makes them more important, not less, than if they'd been ordained by some deity."
If an eternal, perfect, unchanging, omniscient God defines the moral system that is LESS important than if some meat creatures that emerged from the ooze on a giant rock define a constantly changing series of moral systems? Why? As we all know, the meat creatures moral system changes every day, often based largely on the corruption of those in power and if we were to look at the morality of humanity over the last 6,000+ years, almost all of us today would find huge amounts of it to be absolutely disgusting. I'd love to hear why man's moral system is theoretically more important than God's.
'No finite point has meaning without an infinite reference point.' -Jean-Paul Sartre
I don't see how you get around this. I agree that it's, "probably good we have some kind of societal restriction on things like murder and theft", but if we are operating in a context where an eternal reference point (God) has been removed from the equation, these restrictions are just meaningless, arbitrary personal preference.
If codes of conduct are arbitrary, aren't tied to an eternal reference point and can be derived from utilitarian considerations like you suggest, I don't see why 'torturer God' is distasteful for you. God's punishment is utilitarian for Him; to display the full range of His characteristics and to glorify Himself through His righteous wrath.
Personally, I'd have a hard time being smart guy like yourself, being able to see as much of the picture as you do and for my personal moral systematic to be based off of quasi-utilitarianism and personal "ick" factor. I think you are straddling the fence on a dud position. The consistent position is to either embrace the meaningless of it all (as many do) or find the eternal reference point. Personally, I'm putting all my eggs in the Jesus basket and we'll see how it works out. Just my two cents.
"these restrictions are just meaningless, arbitrary personal preference"
Not at all. They're not arbitrary and may well have some evolutionary component. Once you've formed some kind of society, that society will have to work harmoniously together otherwise it will fail.
I think the assertion that 'no God' = arbitrary is wrong. It's a false dichotomy.
What standard, that exists outside of our minds, can you point to that says societal harmony is objectively better than societal chaos? I agree we can inuit it at some level, but intuition is not objective.
How does a big bang and the proceeding chaos of billions of years of ruthless death ever result in any kind of objective moral system? If group X survives 10 years and group Y survives 1,000 years, in this godless system, what do you point to that exists outside of your mind, to say "Group Y's moral system is objectively better than X's"? Why is survival ever objectively "better" than death? Its impossible to objectively define "better" in that system.
If there is a logical, consistent answer to these questions to be given, I've never heard it.
There is no such standard. But neither is there an objective standard to determine which of the various Gods and religions are 'better' than others, either. For that we must rely on our own (arbitrary?) human judgement.
When you come to the conclusion that Christianity represents the truth and is 'better' than all the other religions, what objective standard are you using to come to that conclusion?
I'm a Calvinist. If my systematic theology is correct (I don't expect you to grant me that it is), God generates faith in us and it's not a matter of human judgement. There is no way for me to objectively demonstrate that I've made the correct decision.
My point is that I know you want to be consistent as a general rule (so do I) and I think you've left the playing field entirely for what allows for a consistent position. You want objective morality and when someone steals your wallet, you intuit that it exists but then I think you also agree that in your godless worldview it more or less can't possibly exist. If you've accepted that your worldview can't possibly provide an objective moral standard, then your commentary on how good or bad you think God is isn't worth much. It's just emoting.
I think you grant that theism can at least theoretically provide an objective standard for morality. I don't think you can even theoretically come up with a way that a godless world would generate an objective moral system.
Finally had a chance to read your post. You will love being a grandparent.