Peachy's Ramblings & Muses

(This commentary refers to thoughts as written by C, in a previous post on my web site)

I also agree on the organic process C mentioned. People take the concept of belief in a funny way in religion. It is as if one can turn it on or off like a light bulb. “Believe! Or god will —-?” Really? It takes a THREAT to make people believe? Or a simple statement of what Jesus offers is supposed to be enough?

What ever happened to credibility? Yes, our parents are people we mostly believe, at least when we are little, and that is the most common method of believing. I think that there are few, percentage wise, that are actually convinced by “witnessing” methods used by “missionaries”. People can be persuaded by such to follow, publicly, a religion or group, for social reasons, or because the missionary offers some tangible benefit, such as food or shelter.

But REAL belief, like C believing she’s got ten fingers, or believing that if she steps off the roof, she’ll fall and break a leg – that is different. That takes real evidence, and an acceptance of the credibility of the witness that is trying to make you believe.

Which is where I differ from C’s remarks.

As I noted, there is a default. Any human that has never heard of religion would have no idea of what that is, or who that may be. That is the ultimate definition of an atheist, someone that doesn’t believe in a god or gods.

We all start out as atheists, and our parents, if they are religious, teach us about their faith. Because we believe in the credibility of our parents, we take their word for it. After all, when they told us the stove was hot, it really was, right? …and some of us got the burns to prove it!

So we go on with life, believing in that religion because people we have grown up to believe have good credibility told us it was so.

And that unbroken chain goes back over eighteen hundred years, because there is no existing proof that ANYTHING written in the bible is true. No witnesses, no corroborating archaeological evidence, no secular, non-christian ancient writings or books, NOTHING to prove that Jesus ever existed, or that god ever did the things the Hebrews claimed he did.

There IS plenty of documentary evidence in existence that the authors of the Hebrew Torah may not be who we think they may have been. Moses, for instance, is widely believed in biblical scholarly circles (except for the apologetics) to have been a mythical, heroic figure. After all, he couldn’t have written about his own death, or the aftermath of it, now could he? But no real evidence exists to prove who that real author may have been.

Also, we know NOTHING about any of the new testament authors. The gospels’ authors are unknown, Two thirds of the letters of Paul are now acknowledged to have been forgeries by some unknown later author, and for that matter, the only source that tells us about Paul is…Paul – and that later author who had access to his real letters. (I include Acts here, as its author is the same as Luke, and was written after Paul’s death.) No secular corroborating documentation as to his claim to be a Roman citizen, no Roman evidence of his travels, or his arrest or his execution. And Paul’s writings are the EARLIEST christian writings we have. There are no other writings that could have corroborated his stories written by christians in his time period by people that could have known him, and none of the extant ancient writings we have by secular sources at the time mention him.

Same with other books of the new testament – no known authors. So how can we judge the veracity of those authors? We don’t know who they were, what their agendas may have been, what sources they may have consulted or how believable they may have been personally.

ALL of the evidence for the bible’s veracity is contained in…the bible.

Circular arguments, anybody?

So, how can I believe anything someone today tells me about ANY religion? All of the sacred writings of all of the major religions are, well, ancient! How convenient that the authors are unknown, dead and no longer available for consultation. Nobody today has ever seen or spoken to someone that can directly speak as an eye witness to any of the claims of any major religion.

—-

As for the bigger questions, that goes back to credibility, too. Many scientists over the last three hundred years have worked lifetimes in discovering the knowledge we now have about this universe. Their work is published, open, well studied and well known. It is, in short, credible. I may have trouble myself understanding some of the advanced mathematical concepts now being studied in physics, but I can believe the scientists publishing their study results, because their work is based on earlier work, peer reviewed and thus, credible.

Quite the contrast with religious authorities.

At the end of it all, you’ve got a point, nobody can KNOW for sure that there isn’t a supreme being. But the longer we go without evidence, the more sure we can be that it hasn’t been proven to be true. As I said, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and the default is that it MUST be proven.

In other words, I don’t have to prove there is no god. If you want me to believe, then show me, and show me in a way that will leave no doubt. Don’t use circular arguments, don’t refer to long dead authors of documents that have been added to, deleted from or changed so often we have no idea what they originally said.

I know I sound confrontational, and unlike C, I will not apologize. It bothers me that of all human activities and belief systems, only religion gets a pass on being challenged. People will throw punches at total strangers over football scores, political positions and scientific disagreements, but religion is never supposed to be questioned.

I can walk into a bar and make an observation about politics, and will get challenged immediately almost every time, but why is it that when muslim nations propose an INTERNATIONAL law making “insulting” religion illegal, nobody says jack about it?

I reserve the right to challenge any and all statements about reality that I find incredible, unproven or just plain stupid. If people are offended, well, they’ve undoubtedly been challenged as to their political beliefs, too, so they should learn to deal with it the same way.

Do I want to “convert” anyone? I’d be glad to convince anyone that I’m right. I don’t think it’ll happen often, though, because of the way people handle their beliefs as adults, especially the ones they obtained as kids. So I don’t try to “convert” anybody. But I reserve the right to make my beliefs known under circumstances when and where it is appropriate, and if someone is offended, then well, sorry about that.

My comments are not for the convinced, but for those that are undergoing that organic process that you mentioned above. Hopefully, something I say will get someone else thinking, and maybe they will do some further research. Maybe that will, eventually, convince them, and maybe they will be instrumental in helping someone else do the same. I don’t think of myself as some kind of evangelist. but I will always be glad to talk about what I believe.