« Once again, I praise a New Year's resolution of... nothing | Main | News flash from God's guru: smoking and medical marijuana are evil »

January 02, 2015

Comments

Feed You can follow this conversation by subscribing to the comment feed for this post.

Excelent post Brian, thank you..I to have never been able to take the Bible as the literal Word of G-D, but I had a strange encounter with the bible..I only always read it randomly, and largely out of a sense of duty, having been for so long involved with Eastern thinking I thought it only fair to give my own background some time...I picked up the book, after some time in prayer, and opened to Prophecy of Aggeus (Catholic Bible) page opened at chapter2 verse19...It read..Set your hearts from this day, 24th nineth month, from the day the foundations of the Lord were laid, and lay it up in your hearts...Well it so happened that, that very day was 24thnineth month..Coincidance? Maybe.. But as Sant Mat says..There are no coincidances in Sant Mat.

This bible-debunking reminds me :

I came across Geoffrey Falk's Stripping the Gurus via your site (the link was posted in either one of your posts or perhaps in a comment).

While I enjoyed the book, I found it too, well, cavalier (not as in "not respectful enough", but as in "not researched enough and not thorough enough".

Not to run that book down, not in the least : it's a really great (and really courageous) beginning, but perhaps there'a need, a glaring need, for a comprehensive (and really well-researched and authoritative) work (researched in incontrovertible detail and depth) that examines all religions in detail and debunks them (provided the bases of those religions are suspect, as is likely, but of course it wouldn't be right to assert that a priori).

Let's see, who am I reminded of as someone who'd likely do a really great job in producing this potentially paradigm-challenging work? A certain Brian Hines come to mind! :-)

But of course, even if such incontrovertible proof were published, would the general thinking on religion be really affected? Would it really shake the world? I mean it SHOULD, of course, but WILL it? Somehow that part seems less sure, given the nature of faith.

provided the bases of those religions are suspect...

Aren't all religions "suspect", to say the least? Is there such thing as a religion that is not an expression of faith, i.e., based on the absence of credible evidence?

Aren’t all religions “suspect”, to say the least? Is there such thing as a religion that is not an expression of faith, i.e., based on the absence of credible evidence?


You’re absolutely right, x. All religions are most certainly suspect. No two ways about it!

Actually I was speaking in the context of this particular post. About taking the fight to the enemy, as it were. (The “enemy” here representing not just the loons who believe blindly, but also that portion of our own minds that fantasizes and hopes that just perhaps there’s something to all this. So the "enemy" is, generally speaking, just the adversary in this particular debate.)

One of the cornerstones of the Christian faith is the validity of the Bible as the word of God. Now obviously the whole concept of a Holy Bible is hokum (absent proof that it ISN’T hokum), and naturally the onus of proof for this lies squarely on the Bible worshipping loons, not on skeptics like us.

However, what Kurt Eichenwald has done is to take the fight to the camp of the Bible-worshipping crackpots, as it were, and examined one of their key assumptions. And, by proving that the Bible is no more than a mish-mash of writings cobbled together over time, debunked that key assumption, namely that Bible is directly the word of God. (To be very fair, and fully accurate, I did not myself click on and read that link myself. I’ve only read Brian’s post here, and I’m piggy-backing on Brian’s ‘expertise’ when I say all this, and assume he’s right when he says that this particular debunking has been conclusive and thorough.)

Another way to thus debunk the Bible would, I suppose, be to comprehensively list the whole bunch of factually incorrect as well as morally iffy proclamations within it, and then, basis that solid and incontrovertible background, ask what the odds are that ANYTHING within this work can be trusted absent outside proof.

This isn’t either-or, of course, to debunk the Bible you’d probably best do both, debunk the myth of its origin, as well as show the obvious errors within its contents.

And then, having conclusively demolished the validity of the Bible, you move on to debunk the other remaining cornerstones of the Christian faith.

Why do this? One doesn’t strictly need to, actually : you’re absolutely right, x, when you say (or imply) that the onus of proving that the Bible is a magic-book, and that Christianity is the One Magic Creed, is on those who buy into that magic. But one would do this for probably any (any one, or more than one, or perhaps all) of the reasons why one takes the trouble to write any seriously researched book (as opposed to simply settling the question to one’s own individual and personal satisfaction) : to influence other people (which immediately raises the question, why bother influencing other people—and the answer is that it’s cool if one doesn’t want that, and no need then to bother with this project, at least in so far as driven by this particular motivation) ; to conclusively settle the (Christian) religion question once and for all ; because the work itself will probably be of great interest to someone with a research-oriented mind and general inclination towards areas such as this ; and no doubt also for the money (perhaps even riches) and recognition (perhaps even fame and celebrity) that such a project, successfully undertaken, will hopefully bring in.

And I was saying (just thinking aloud) that perhaps someone would do this, rigorously and conclusively, for ALL religions, not just Christianity.

- - - - -

But then, even if someone did take the trouble to do all this, and managed to execute it flawlessly, would they still, at the end of it all, really cause the world to shudder and shake out of the religious stupor that has held it captive so long, and still holds so many so strongly?

Doubtful, given the nature of faith! To take the example of just the Christ-cult itself (the many different versions of the Christ-cult, that is) : First, I suppose this has already been done by different people at different times, to more or less degree (I’m not aware enough of such research, but it seems likely, at least with Christianity, that such debunking has already been done piecemeal if not exhaustively), and yet it’s not awoken those who refuse to stop dreaming. Also, believers have innovative ways of countering such research (even if/when conclusive) to their own loony selves, perhaps by saying that God moves in mysterious ways, and chooses to let his Word filter down to us fallible mortals in such roundabout ways (so that debunking the provenance of the Bible may well end up actually further cementing the faith of the faithful, who see a further miracle in the way God’s word is conveyed to us in bits and pieces, over centuries, or some circuitous nonsense like that).

And finally, should those who undertake this project dare to include within the ambit of their study that unique religion, that One religion that stands out head over shoulders for its exceptional sanity in a whole clutch of very sane religions, that religion which ironically takes its name from Peace, whose name actually MEANS “peace” (among other things) : well then, in that case, the faithful followers of the One True Prophet (Peace, paradoxically, Be Unto Him) would probably settle the question far more conclusively than mere words, whether spoken or written, ever can : via far more robust arguments like the sword, gun, bomb or suicide vest.

Have you read “Stripping the Gurus”, x? Just in case you haven’t, do try it out : you I’m sure will enjoy how he’s savaged (tried to, that is) the wise men who, across faiths, try to hand down the Truth (with capital T) to us. The ebook is available free online, just plug “Stripping the Gurus” into Google. I found it a wonderful concept, and a potentially MAJOR project, but executed very shoddily, and nowhere near fully exhaustively (or convincingly). Much too little actual research there, and it was all presented rather hysterically. I repeat, I’m not trying to run the book or its author down on here : on the contrary, I salute his idea and courage and effort. After all this was just one single man working alone, unassisted, over a few short months. But the idea of researching religion’s bases, taking the fight to the enemy, and (probably) debunking those bases (“probably”, I say, because we can’t in all fairness really assert this a priori without first doing that spade work) : that’s a HUGE idea and project, with potentially HUGE impact.

...that unique religion, that One religion that stands out head over shoulders for its exceptional sanity in a whole clutch of very sane religions, that religion which ironically takes its name from Peace, whose name actually MEANS “peace” (among other things) : well then, in that case, the faithful followers of the One True Prophet (Peace, paradoxically, Be Unto Him)

What are you referring to? Is there such a thing as a "sane" religion? Faith is a form of insanity, how ever venerated or tolerated, so do tell what the hell you're talking about.

...that unique religion, that One religion that stands out head over shoulders for its exceptional sanity in a whole clutch of very sane religions, that religion which ironically takes its name from Peace, whose name actually MEANS “peace” (among other things) : well then, in that case, the faithful followers of the One True Prophet (Peace, paradoxically, Be Unto Him)


What are you referring to? Is there such a thing as a "sane" religion? Faith is a form of insanity, how ever venerated or tolerated, so do tell what the hell you're talking about.


That was a lovely comment, x. You’ve got me ROFLOL!

The only thing that I’m undecided about, as I struggle to type while simultaneously rolling on the floor laughing out loud, is whether you’ve got a wicked sense of humor and I’m laughing at your wickedly straight-faced joke, or whether I’m laughing at you.

If the former, then the laugh’s on me! If the latter, then hint : Just re-read my earlier post a bit more carefully.

Poe’s Law at work! The law, taken literally, applies to fundamentalists ; but of course its application is far more general in practice, and it works just as well for fundamentalist-bashers : as you’ve so brilliantly demonstrated here.

Cheers!

Verify your Comment

Previewing your Comment

This is only a preview. Your comment has not yet been posted.

Working...
Your comment could not be posted. Error type:
Your comment has been posted. Post another comment

The letters and numbers you entered did not match the image. Please try again.

As a final step before posting your comment, enter the letters and numbers you see in the image below. This prevents automated programs from posting comments.

Having trouble reading this image? View an alternate.

Working...

Post a comment

Your Information

(Name is required. Email address will not be displayed with the comment.)

Welcome


  • Welcome to the Church of the Churchless. If this is your first visit, click on "About this site--start here" in the Categories section below.
  • HinesSight
    Visit my other weblog, HinesSight, for a broader view of what's happening in the world of your Church unpastor, his wife, and dog.
  • BrianHines.com
    Take a look at my web site, which contains information about a subject of great interest to me: me.
  • Twitter with me
    Join Twitter and follow my tweets about whatever.
  • I Hate Church of the Churchless
    Can't stand this blog? Believe the guy behind it is an idiot? Rant away on our anti-site.