Judas gospels [Archive] - Quarter To Three Forums

Unicorn McGriddle

04-06-2006, 09:41 PM

Alternatively, when Matthew wrote that he had no way of knowing the real deal.

Edit: To clarify the part of this that I originally just left implied, eyewitness accounts are always colored by their perspective. Sure, Matthew quotes Jesus as condemning Judas, but there are a lot of instances where the Gospels don't match up even on direct quotes. The Gospels were written at a very interesting time in the apostles' lives, in a Fight Club sense of the phrase. They all sought to add color, detail, and precision to their memories of what were -- for them -- very calamitous events. Perhaps these phrases about Judas being damned were actually kicked around shortly after it all went down, with Matthew and (for example) Luke hiding out in a safe house somewhere in Jerusalem, with their AK-74s in their nervous, sweaty hands, occasionally peeking through the drawn venetian blinds to see if soldiers were coming down the street to break in and arrest them, shaking their heads in shock and saying, "I don't believe it; this is terrible," over and over again. "Man, FUCK Judas. I mean, seriously, when God finds out about this shit, he is FUCKED." "Yeah. What a little bitch." And then later, when they get their heads together a bit and decide that the world has to know what really happened, some of those ideas find their way into the finished product. Kinda how the human mind works.

Jason McCullough

04-06-2006, 10:05 PM

The christianity we have today is the one whose opinions survived the early political infighting. Unicorn's summary is funnier, though.

Unicorn McGriddle

04-06-2006, 11:43 PM

The christianity we have today is the one whose opinions survived the early political infighting.

Goes without saying. Look at Islam for another excellent example of that kind of issue still lacking a decisive answer (Sunnis/Shiites).

Unicorn's summary is funnier, though.

For once, I was going for serious. The Christian mythos may be pretty intense, but it's not so alien that similar things don't happen all the time unheralded. The whole situation with the disciples and the execution and the conflicting accounts could have taken place at any time during human history thus far, including the present. All you need is an underclass, and whether the weapons under their cloaks are daggers or firearms doesn't really matter in the long run.

Tim Partlett

04-07-2006, 02:24 AM

So Jesus basically committed suicide?

Nellie

04-07-2006, 04:25 AM

I was under the impression that the new testament doesn't contain all the gospels/accounts concerning the life of Jesus anyway (Gnostic Gospels for example) merely the ones approved by "the Church" several hundred years ago as their official dogma.

Crispus

04-07-2006, 05:10 AM

Nellie

04-07-2006, 05:23 AM

From what I've read, this "gospel" is a hundred years older than the original four gospels. So, I'm not quite sure what the hubbub is about. It's neat to find anything this old, but it's just an old Gnostic text, not some scandalous revelation that sheds trustworthy light on Biblical events.

The copy itself is thought to date from around 300ad according to some of the reports, but that is also thought to be a copy of an older Greek text. Either way they don't seem to be able to date it much closer than around 100 years after Judas died.

Unicorn McGriddle

04-07-2006, 05:24 AM

IANABS (I Am Not A Biblical Scholar), but Nellie's right. In fact, as I recall, one book even got disincluded (or perhaps just edited) because the Church officials involved felt that "Christ taught Lazarus his secrets" was too close to "Christ and Lazarus had sex in the butt." To the pure, all things are pure...

Crispus, the Bible and the Apocrypha are both fun reads all around, but trustworthy does not describe any of them. They tend to have limited value as historical documents, especially since the early Christians were a bunch of unstable lotus-eaters with a collective hardon for Stone Age politics. Glad that's over with, eh?

Edit: I was referring to Nellie's earlier post about the Church compiling the books of the Bible, not the newer post just above this one.

Nellie

04-07-2006, 05:39 AM

Troy S Goodfellow

04-07-2006, 06:02 AM

At the risk of sounding like a (probably just as badly written) paragraph from the Da Vinci code, it appears there are at least 30 unofficial gospels relating to the life of Jesus. Many of which if not authored directly by, were championed by early Christian sects such as the gnostics. In a prime example of the victors write history, the leading sect of early christianity (which I presume became Catholocism) which managed to excert most influence championed it's own gospels and hid away or declared heretical those that didn't fit it's own version of events or were favoured by other franchises.

This doesn't take into account that Mark - the most human and least divine of the Gospels - makes the cut. Mark is the earliest of the Gospels, likely written in the 1st century, but also the one that makes the fewest claims about Jesus as a deity or even son of deity.

The four canonical Gospels, in fact, are kept together as a group in fragments dating from the mid-2nd century (150-180ish) - well before Christianity was a state religion with serious power plays. The big debates over the canon in the early church dealt with whether and which Pauline epistles were canon, not whether Gnostic ramblings were reliable or not. Iraeneus uses the recognized orthodoxy of Luke to justify inclusion of the Acts of the Apostles.

New "gospels" were being written constantly in the 2nd and 3rd century. One of them has a child Jesus turning his playmates to stone - an attempt to bring more of the usual pagan mythos into his life, I guess. Judas is just one more and only really interesting because of the name attached to it. A Gospel of Dorcas wouldn't have gotten this kind of coverage.

Troy

Matthew Gallant

04-07-2006, 06:20 AM

A Gospel of Dorcas wouldn't have gotten this kind of coverage. http://www.truemeaningoflife.com/images/dorcas.jpg

JessicaM

04-07-2006, 06:37 AM

Note that none of the Apostles actually wrote the Gospel that has his name on it (it was the habit for religous writers at the time to write in the name of others; go figure). From near as I can tell from browsing around, most scholars seem to agree that the earliest Gospel was written at least 40 years after the Crucifixtion and the latest as much as 150 years after, though there is a lot of mud wrestling and knife-poking among those same scholars as they jockey for position.

So even if the Judas gospel was copied from earlier work, it is unlikely to have been penned by Judas himself. Not that it isn't fascinating as hell.

Phil_Stein

04-07-2006, 07:25 AM

There's a lot of misinformation above. I'm not a biblical scholar, but I've read a fair amount about it. Take the following as a starting point and do your own research.

Most reputable biblical scholars (both Christian and secular), date the 4 gospels at between 60-75 AD for Mathew, Mark and Luke (Mark generally being perceived as the earliest), and around 85-90 AD for John. Paul's letters (epistles), many of which include/replicate key aspects of the history of Jesus, date earlier, from about 50-65 AD.

(one set of dates can be found here: http://www.theology.edu/faq01.htm)

While there is certainly scholarly debate on these datings, generally, the mainstream debate would push the dates of each gospel forward or backward by about a decade. That still puts all the canonical gospels well before the (likely) dates of things like this gospel of Judas.

Authorship:
Matthew - generally agreed to be the apostle Mathew
Mark - generally agreed to be a close associate of the apostle Peter
Luke - generally agreed to be a doctor who attended to and followed Paul (the latter was not an apostle, but obviously a major early church leader)
John - generally agreed to be the apostle John

It is possible that Matthew, in particular was not written by the apostle Matthew (the naming is by old tradition, not within the gospel itself). Some dispute the authorship of John as well.

The apocryphal gospels (like this Judas gospel), when they can be dated, generally date to much later - usually at least 100 years later.

They don't just pull these dates out of nowhere. They're arrived at in a number of ways, including internal references (what historical events in the early church and Jewish/Roman history are referenced/foreshadowed in the various books), external references (when do reliable external sources reference the books), early church history/tradition, and how widespread and widely accepted the books were (the theory being that a book that was spread widely around the Mediterranean at a comparitively early date was much more likely to be an older book than one that had a narrower/later reach).

The early church didn't just select these 4 gospels, and the other books of the canonical New Testament, at random from amid a sea of possibilities. Rather, these books enjoyed wide acceptance throughout all of the scattered early churches. i.e. they weren't accepted because they were canon, but rather, they became canon because they were accepted.

There was some dispute about whether to include a few of the New Testament books, but not the gospels. Rather, certain epistles (IIRC, Hebrews, James, Peter 2, John 2 & 3, Jude) and Revelations. But they were eventually fully accepted as well.

Drastic

04-07-2006, 09:25 AM

Plus, the editting wars were really just the tip of the iceberg in "the" Church's early spasms to define what it actually believed, and by spasms I mean generations of sometimes vicious political maneuvering. When Jesus Became God (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0156013150/sr=8-1/qid=1144426602/ref=pd_bbs_1/103-4490570-2743844?%5Fencoding=UTF8) is a pretty engaging read on the subject.

For all the Gnostic gospels you can shake a stick at, The Nag Hammadi Library (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0060669357/sr=8-1/qid=1144426610/ref=pd_bbs_1/103-4490570-2743844?%5Fencoding=UTF8), after the best-known large recovered cache of them, is not quite as engaging. The Gospel of Thomas is pretty damn quotable, and includes a final verse praising female-to-male trannies (in a spiritual sense!) for added wackiness, and you get more trippy writings like The Thunder, Perfect Mind.

Jason McCullough

04-07-2006, 09:39 AM

Vacitan responds LA LA LA NOT LISTENING (http://www.zenit.org/english/visualizza.phtml?sid=87247).

Troy S Goodfellow

04-07-2006, 09:51 AM

Vacitan responds LA LA LA NOT LISTENING (http://www.zenit.org/english/visualizza.phtml?sid=87247).

Wouldn't a more accurate summary be "Vatican reponds 'Interesting, but not really a big deal, faithwise." ?

Which is kind of what Phil and I said. Only Phil said it better.

Troy

Reeko

04-07-2006, 11:23 AM

Phil, look at The Canon of Scripture (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/083081258X/sr=1-1/qid=1144433854/ref=pd_bbs_1/002-5320582-0985635?%5Fencoding=UTF8&s=books) by F.F. Bruce. He gets into all this stuff, and talks about the scriptures that don't make it. Interesting stuff, all around. It's really interesting to note that the earliest Greek text we have that includes all of the books that are in the modern New Testament (Codex Sinaiticus - 4th century) also has something called The Letter of Barnabus and a part of Shepherd of Hermas.

Plus, the editting wars were really just the tip of the iceberg in "the" Church's early spasms to define what it actually believed, and by spasms I mean generations of sometimes vicious political maneuvering. When Jesus Became God (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0156013150/sr=8-1/qid=1144426602/ref=pd_bbs_1/103-4490570-2743844?%5Fencoding=UTF8) is a pretty engaging read on the subject.

Try God Crucified (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0802846424/sr=8-4/qid=1144432919/ref=pd_bbs_4/002-5320582-0985635?%5Fencoding=UTF8) by Richard Bauckham. He's primarily writing in opposition to people who see Jesus fitting into strict Jewish monotheism because he is an intermediary "demigod." His point is, that even for the earliest Christians (predominately Jewish), Jesus as God did fit into strict monotheism. The idea is that Jews of the day didn't think along Greek lines of classification. 2nd-temple Judaism thought of God according to his actions, rather than a set of characteristics. By ascribing activity to Jesus that is normally only ascribed to God, they are saying that Jesus is God. So, when the Gospel of John says "all things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being", it is equal to a direct inclusion of Jesus into the Godhead from all eternity. At the same time, "the Word" (Jesus) is kept distinct from "God" (what we refer to as the Father). The councils and creeds came about as this Jewish way of thinking ran into a world of Greek philosophy that demanded "He is..." statements.

Troy S Goodfellow

04-07-2006, 11:33 AM

Reeko

04-07-2006, 02:48 PM

Right, but don't we have lots of earlier references to canons that include only the four Gospels we now recognize?

Oh, yeah. The Muratorian Fragment is a 7th century copy of a Latin document that was written in the late 2nd century. It is damaged, but the portion that remains speaks of Luke and John being the 3rd and 4th Gospel narratives - with some legends of how the authors were inspired to write them.

The author then goes on to list what books were held to be authoritative in Rome at the time, saying that Paul's letter to the Laodiceans and Alexandrines were forgeries written by followers of the heretic Marcion.

None of the writings of Iranaeus (became Bishop of Lyons in 177 AD) have survived. However, the church historian Eusebius quotes his work in his Church History of ~305 AD. Apparently, Iranaeus lists 4 gospels - and goes through some tortured logic as to why there should be only 4, and no more. F.F. Bruce says of this work,

"...the general impression given by his words is that the fourfold pattern of the gospel was by this time no innovation but so widely accepted that he can stress its cosmic appropriateness as though it were a fact of nature... It is the mark of heresy, he says, to concentrate on one of the four to the virtual exclusion of the others, as the Valentinians, according to him, concentrated on the Gospel of John."

The entire NT canon takes a while to get resolved, certainly, but it's mostly, IIRC, about Epistles and other faith narratives, not Lives of Jesus.

Absolutely. In fact, the canon of scripture is still not really sealed. This is where so many people misunderstand what scripture is. If this Gospel of Judas, so recently found, was considered to be theologically in union with the other texts, and early enough in date - there is no reason to exclude it from scripture. But as it sits, it appears to be written later and in support of a position that was never considered orthodox by any church father - the idea that Jesus's body wasn't really him, but kind of a husk that he shed when he died. So, no. The Gospel of Judas is out.

Jason McCullough

04-07-2006, 04:57 PM

Documents are invalid if they don't agree with the documents we've decided are valid. :)

Rimbo

04-07-2006, 05:03 PM

Jesus gets ressurected, the rest of us get saved, and Judas gets condemned for making it all happen. So who's the one who really paid for our sins in this scenario? The guy who gets the do-over, or the one who actually ended up stuck with the check?

Because Judas was the Scapegoat of God.

Presumably, Judas is subject to Christ's forgiveness, same as the rest of us.

When I found that the text was held by Gnostic sects, that clears up in my mind what this gospel is about.

Rimbo

04-07-2006, 05:07 PM

http://www.truemeaningoflife.com/images/dorcas.jpg

Best. P&R post. Ever.

runesword forger

04-07-2006, 05:49 PM

There's a lot of misinformation above. I'm not a biblical scholar, but I've read a fair amount about it. Take the following as a starting point and do your own research.

Most reputable biblical scholars (both Christian and secular), date the 4 gospels at between 60-75 AD for Mathew, Mark and Luke (Mark generally being perceived as the earliest), and around 85-90 AD for John. Paul's letters (epistles), many of which include/replicate key aspects of the history of Jesus, date earlier, from about 50-65 AD.

(one set of dates can be found here: http://www.theology.edu/faq01.htm)

While there is certainly scholarly debate on these datings, generally, the mainstream debate would push the dates of each gospel forward or backward by about a decade. That still puts all the canonical gospels well before the (likely) dates of things like this gospel of Judas.

Authorship:
Matthew - generally agreed to be the apostle Mathew
Mark - generally agreed to be a close associate of the apostle Peter
Luke - generally agreed to be a doctor who attended to and followed Paul (the latter was not an apostle, but obviously a major early church leader)
John - generally agreed to be the apostle John

It is possible that Matthew, in particular was not written by the apostle Matthew (the naming is by old tradition, not within the gospel itself). Some dispute the authorship of John as well.

The apocryphal gospels (like this Judas gospel), when they can be dated, generally date to much later - usually at least 100 years later.
.

The dating is a bit more complex than this because parts of Gospels are thought to be added and edited later. The earliest gospel, Mark, has an (in)famous "appendix" added on to make it comply with later orthodox theology.

I would also add that the Gospel of Thomas -- parts of it at least -- is thought by some to predate John. Elaine Pagels has put forth an interesting theory about John being the orthodox rebuttal to Thomas, this also being the origin of the "Doubting Thomas" story in John that is not present elsewhere.

None of the gospels are thought to be written by their namesakes.

shift6

04-07-2006, 07:06 PM

The earliest extant fragment of the Gospels is named P52 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rylands_Library_Papyrus_P52) and is reasonably dated to between 100-150AD. It contains some portions of John 18. However, there is a fragment among the Dead Sea Scrolls named 7Q5 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/7Q5) which is dated to no later than 68AD. It contains very few letters (believed by some to be from the Book of Mark), but if it is pieced with another fragment from the DSS and demonstrated as being from the gospel, will be absolutely huge in archaeological, historical, and theological importance. This isn't totally outside the realm of possibility since so much of the DSS still haven't been indexed and examined.

As for canonization, the NT was recognized more or less in its current format in Codex Sinaiticus, 4th century AD (current NT, with Barabbas and Hermas in an appendix); Codex Vaticanus, 4th century AD (current NT minus Timothy, Titus, Philemon, Revelation); Codex Alexandrinus, 5th century AD (current NT, with Clement as an appendix), the Muratorian fragment, about 170AD (the four gospels, Acts, Jude, and the 13 Pauline epistles). The Epistles of Clement and Epistle of Barnabas also recognize the majority of the NT.

Then there were "early fathers" of the Church such as Polycarp, Ignatius, Papius, and other who didn't explicitly list the NT books, but who quoted them in their own writings (between 100-200AD). Athanasius of Alexandria considered the NT canonical as it stands now in a letter written about 367AD. Pope Damasus identified the NT canon as now about 382. A Carthage synod in 397 also canonized the modern NT.

Phil_Stein

04-07-2006, 08:30 PM

The dating is a bit more complex than this because parts of Gospels are thought to be added and edited later. The earliest gospel, Mark, has an (in)famous "appendix" added on to make it comply with later orthodox theology.

Certainly biblical dating is complex. But I'm not sure that it's closely related to the issue of possible alterations. The only two significant sections of the gospel subject to THAT discussion, that I'm aware of, are the ending of Mark, and the story of the adulterous woman (John 8)

None of the gospels are thought to be written by their namesakes.
Huh? There's little serious debate on the authorship of Luke. Some critics argue variously the authorship of the others, but, at least from what I've read, it's reasonably probable that Matthew, Mark and John authored their namesake gospels as well.

This is a fairly good link on gospel authorship:
http://www.tektonics.org/ntdocdef/gospdefhub.html
It's a Christian site, to be sure, but the arguments and supporting evidence listed seem solid.

TomChick

04-07-2006, 09:33 PM

Some critics argue variously the authorship of the others, but, at least from what I've read, it's reasonably probable that Matthew, Mark and John authored their namesake gospels as well.

Phil, this is absolutely incorrect. There is no serious* Biblical scholarship to that effect. It's highly unlikely that the authors of the Gospels ever even met Jesus. They draw from earlier sources that are lost to us and that may very well be the work of the Apostles, but the Gospels in their current form certainly weren't written by the Apostles.

-Tom

* I don't mean that as a slight, but rather as a way to indicate peer reviewed academic work that doesn't proceed from a faith-based perspective.

TomChick

04-07-2006, 09:41 PM

This is a fairly good link on gospel authorship:

Holy cats, Phil, I just had a look and that stuff is terrible. If this is a matter of faith for you, that's one thing and I hope you're not hanging your hat on Biblical scholarship. Scripture is far more important than that.

But if it's a matter of academic curiousity, you'd do far better to just, I dunno, check Wikipedia or something.

-Tom

Phil_Stein

04-07-2006, 11:12 PM

Tom, I don't read biblical studies journals, peer-reviewed or not. As I said, I'm not a biblical scholar (nor a scholar of the origins of the bible/Christianity). But I've read the summaries of such research - both summarized by Christian and secular sources, both by non-Christians (skeptics) and by Christians. To say that there is "no serious Biblical scholarship" to that effect is far out of line with what I've read. Among researchers who are secular and non-Christian, there are certainly some who would dispute authorship and dating on the gospels, but I've read others who do not. For that matter, some Christian writers also dispute these. While earlier dating and apostolic authorship are certainly helpful to the Christian cause (i.e. making the gospels more authoritative/less likely to be distorted), it's not necessary for gospels to be accurate (merely supportive).

Case in point - Bruce Metzger is the sole scholarly source for the Wikipedia page on gospel authorship and dating. He's the professor emeritus at Princeton Theological Seminary, and probably the pre-eminent living New Testament scholar. He does in fact state that the authorship of the gospels is "unknown" (Though I believe the Wikipedia article creator has stretched that to say that say that Apostolic involvement in authorship is somewhere between unlikely and absurd - I can't find on-line support in actual Metzger quotes for that viewpoint). Also note that the author of the Wikipedia article draws not on Metzger directly, but on a summary on a site called 'infidels.org', leading me to suspect that the Wikipedia article author is possibly a less than entirely neutral source.

But despite Metzger's views on authorship, he also has a high opinion of the accuracy of the New Testament, and of the canon as accepted by the early church and in use today. He believes that the New Testament was authored by fallible humans, and is certainly not in the 'inerrant bible' camp (thus earning the emnity of some very fundamentalists Christians), and yet he is a believing Christian. (It's interesting that infidels.org should include such a lengthy summary of Metzger's work, but, so be it).

I certainly can't read/speak ancient greek, so I can't personally judge issues of literary style/grammar/word usage that are sometimes used in these debates. But most of the other arguments (on both sides) are accessible to the lay reader with a reasonable knowledge of the contents of the gospels/NT, and of 1st century Christian history. Based on my readings, I find it more probable than not that the bible authors are who they are generally claimed to be, and that the dates range from ~60 to ~90 AD.

Again, I would encourage the curious to do their own reading/research. Be wary of much of what's on the web - there are a lot of cranks out there (on both sides of the debate). But you can probably find 20-50 books on these subjects at your local Borders/Barnes & Noble, again, representing multiple points of view. Read/skim them and form your own opinions.

TomChick

04-08-2006, 12:14 AM

Phil, I'm not trying to convince you of anything, and I completely agree that there are plenty of unreliable sources. I don't know the first thing about Wikipedia's pages, but I was just throwing that out there as an example.

But when you're talking about the conventional academic wisdom, supported by the community of people over the years who've made it their lives' work to investigate who wrote the Bible and when, you won't find anyone seriously suggesting that any of the Gospels were written by their respective Apostles.

-Tom

Phil_Stein

04-08-2006, 06:54 AM

But when you're talking about the conventional academic wisdom, supported by the community of people over the years who've made it their lives' work to investigate who wrote the Bible and when, you won't find anyone seriously suggesting that any of the Gospels were written by their respective Apostles.

-Tom

Tom - this amounts to "Everybody says X", without, in fact, listing anybody, who says X. I don't know how or where you're drawing your conclusions. Have you done a lot of reading on the subject? Both sides of the debate? My reading is certainly not exhaustive, and I'm not sure if all the authors I've read would fit whatever standards you put forth. I certainly haven't read 'everybody'. But in the limited reading I have done, I've seen more and better stuff on the side of the 'conventional' authorships than against it. To cut off the debate with the sweeping conclusion that there IS NO debate seems simplistic and not in synch (at all) with my reading.

runesword forger

04-08-2006, 07:19 AM

For an even-handed account of conservative vs. scholarly views on religion, I recommend the www.religioustolerance.org site.

And I am not trying to bait anyone with the term "scholarly." As Tom implies, it's simply the consensus of peer-reviewed academic journals. That doesn't mean you have to prefer them over the faithful orthodox. The religioustolerance website also includes footnotes so you can follow trails if you like.

Phil, I have to agree with Tom that the scholarly view is that there is no reason to think that the gospels are written by their namesakes.

I also hasten to add that "the ending of Mark and John:8" are the not the only parts of the canonical gospels that have been altered. John 21 is also well-known as an addition (brings Peter back into good graces). There are many smaller modifications. The fragmentary "secret" verses of Mark are particularly controversial to some.

Anyway.... see http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_ntb1.htm
for an account of the the canonical gospels and a few gnostic ones.

For the letters of Paul, see http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_ntb3.htm.

Matthew Gallant

04-08-2006, 08:45 AM

Tom - I don't know how or where you're drawing your conclusions. Have you done a lot of reading on the subject?
Tee hee.

MattKeil

04-08-2006, 11:11 AM

Tom - this amounts to "Everybody says X", without, in fact, listing anybody, who says X. I don't know how or where you're drawing your conclusions. Have you done a lot of reading on the subject? Both sides of the debate? My reading is certainly not exhaustive, and I'm not sure if all the authors I've read would fit whatever standards you put forth. I certainly haven't read 'everybody'. But in the limited reading I have done, I've seen more and better stuff on the side of the 'conventional' authorships than against it. To cut off the debate with the sweeping conclusion that there IS NO debate seems simplistic and not in synch (at all) with my reading.

Which, of course, does not alter the fact that there is no debate. I mean, technically there's a "debate" about whether or not aliens have been abducting Americans and taking them to Area 51 or whatever, but...yeah. I read your original post and was worried it would pass without comment. Thank God for Tom Chick.

Not even the people running the Christianity show think the apostles wrote the Gospels. I was taught in two separate Catholic schools by an ordained priest and a Christian Brother (most of this is from memory, and these classes were a decade ago, so don't take it as, y'know, Gospel) that all four Gospels are written accounts of oral traditions handed down by various sects of Christianity who had essentially chosen "patron apostles" as their figureheads. Mark was the earliest, and most likely to contain eyewitness accounts from people who knew Jesus (or at least people who knew people who knew him). Matthew is the product of a sect dedicated to attracting Jewish converts. Luke was from a Gentile-snagging tradition. Luke and Matthew both use Mark as a source. John was far later than the other three and may be totally unrelated to them. Even a cursory readthrough can show this, as John doesn't repeat many of the same stories and has very different themes and a writing style distinct from the others.

So yeah, the people who decide the canon and claim to have the partyline to the Big Guy personally told me that nobody who knew Jesus wrote anything down at all. The people who disagree are probably the same people who insist that Moses wrote the Pentateuch, including the part where he dies. Now, granted, it took the Catholic Church centuries to admit the earth revolves around the sun, but when it comes to this issue, I'd think the Vatican would be all over that shit if new evidence popped up that Mark actually wrote his Gospel.

TomChick

04-08-2006, 12:56 PM

I don't know how or where you're drawing your conclusions. Have you done a lot of reading on the subject? Both sides of the debate?

Firstly, apologies of this sounds patronizing, but I feel strongly about it.

Regardless of my qualifications, I think it's important to consider whether you're approaching this from a position of faith, Phil. If you are, which I suspect is the case, I think the conversation should take a very different tack.

The Gospels -- and the entire Bible, in fact -- are not wrong, inaccurate, or in any way less special because of how they were written or by whom. There is an important Truth in there that shouldn't hinge on any mere literal truth. They're far too beautiful and amazing for that.

With regard to the Gospels, something happened a few thousand years ago that should have meant the end of what Jesus was trying to accomplish. But for whatever reason, it didn't. A misunderstood rabbi and a small handful of his followers were martyred and persecuted, but they still changed the world for the better. If that's not the Good News, that God somehow transcended death and defeat, that He actually reached into history, than I don't know what is. Proceed from there. Not from whether Mark actually wrote Mark.

Because to establish that Mark actually wrote Mark, you're going to have to have a make a great sacrifice: your intellect. And that's something no religion should demand of someone like you.

-Tom

Phil_Stein

04-08-2006, 02:34 PM

For an even-handed account of conservative vs. scholarly views on religion, I recommend the www.religioustolerance.org site.

And I am not trying to bait anyone with the term "scholarly."

[snip]

Anyway.... see http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_ntb1.htm
for an account of the the canonical gospels and a few gnostic ones.

[snip]

First, you may not be trying to bait anyone with your terminology, but it certainly comes across that way. Anyways...

Second, the article you link to does not seem tone neutral to me. To give one quick example: His section on Luke opens:

"Luke" was motivated to write the gospel and its sequel, the book of Acts, because he felt that previous gospels written by eyewitnesses to Jesus' ministry lacked accuracy.

Wow - it's a double whammy - implying that this revisinionist account goes against the more reliable "eyewitness gospels". I can only assume the author is basing this on the preface to Luke. In fact, that preface reads:

1Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled[a] among us, 2just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. 3Therefore, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, it seemed good also to me to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, [NIV]

No mention of inaccuracy in previous eyewitness gospels. In fact, no actual mention of previous gospels, only "accounts".

A few sentences later, in the rather sparse overall analysis of Luke, he recounts a single theologian's speculation that Luke was a woman, on the thinnest of thin logic. Rather sensational, frankly, and leads me to be skeptical of the rest of his article.

Getting to the heart of the matter - gospel authorship:

Re: Matthew

Conservative Christians generally assert that the gospel was written by the disciple Matthew, perhaps 45 CE or earlier. The Scofield Bible states that the traditionally accepted date is 37 CE, only 4 to 7 years after Jesus' execution. 11,12,13,16
bullet Liberals believe that the name of the author is unknown. It was written after the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple in 70 CE, because it describes the event in Matthew 24. Various authorities date Matthew about 85 CE. 6,7,10,19

Re: Mark

Many Christian writers of the 2nd century CE identified the author as the John-Marcus who was mentioned in Acts 12:12. Mark was a helper who went with Paul and Barnabas on Paul's first missionary journey. Liberal theologians generally believe that the identity of the author is unknown. 6,7,10,19 Conservatives follow the church tradition that the author was Mark.

Re: Luke

Most conservative Christians believe that Luke was a doctor who accompanied Paul on his missionary journeys. 11,12,13,16 Most liberal Christians believe that Luke was an educated person whose identity is unknown. 6,7,10,19

Re: John

Conservative Christians typically believe that the entire gospel, including the addition, was made by John, the disciple. 11,12,13,16
bullet Liberal Christians typically believe that it was written by a group of authors, and that Chapter 21 was added by a later editor of the gospel. 6,7,10,19

So, summarized, the article author states:
Conservatives - Matthew, Mark, Luke and John all by the traditional authors
Liberals - Matthew, Mark, Luke - all unknown. John, by committee.

Unknown does not equal "Not Matthew Mark or Luke", it equals unknown. And I see nothing in the article to indicate that there is no debate on the subject - rather quite the contrary. And again, this is your link, and an article whose author, IMO, does not strike me as tone neutral to begin with.

Rimbo

04-08-2006, 02:41 PM

TomChick++;

Phil_Stein

04-08-2006, 02:55 PM

Not even the people running the Christianity show think the apostles wrote the Gospels. I was taught in two separate Catholic schools by an ordained priest and a Christian Brother (most of this is from memory, and these classes were a decade ago, so don't take it as, y'know, Gospel) that all four Gospels are written accounts of oral traditions handed down by various sects of Christianity who had essentially chosen "patron apostles" as their figureheads. Mark was the earliest, and most likely to contain eyewitness accounts from people who knew Jesus (or at least people who knew people who knew him). Matthew is the product of a sect dedicated to attracting Jewish converts. Luke was from a Gentile-snagging tradition. Luke and Matthew both use Mark as a source. John was far later than the other three and may be totally unrelated to them. Even a cursory readthrough can show this, as John doesn't repeat many of the same stories and has very different themes and a writing style distinct from the others.

The similarity of the synoptic gospels is not in dispute, and a discussion of THAT is yet another long thread derail that I don't want to get into.

As for gospel authorship:
I can't directly comment on what your teachers taught you a decade ago. But a quick google hits the Catholic Encyclopedia, which, AFAIK, expresses the 'official' opinion of the Catholic Church. It has fairly lengthy articles on each gospel, including authorship, outlining aspects of the debate, such as it is. Here's the links, and conclusions from the linked articles (quick summary - they strongly support traditional authorships of Mark and Luke, somewhat less strongly the traditional authorship of John, and with less clarity, and a probably more convuluted origin, for Matthew):

Matthew (http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/10057a.htm)
According to the majority of present critics--H. Holtzmann, Wendt, Jülicher, Wernle, von Soden, Wellhausen, Harnack, B. Weiss, Nicolardot, W. Allen, Montefiore, Plummer, and Stanton--the author of the First Gospel used two documents: the Gospel of Mark in its present or in an earlier form, and a collection of discourses or sayings, which is designated by the letter Q. The repetitions occurring in Matthew (v, 29, 30 = xviii, 8, 9; v, 32 xix, 9; x, 22a = xxiv, 9b; xii, 39b = xvi, 4a, etc.) may be explained by the fact that two sources furnished the writer with material for his Gospel. Furthermore, Matthew used documents of his own.

Mark (http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09674b.htm#II)
All early tradition connects the Second Gospel with two names, those of St. Mark and St. Peter, Mark being held to have written what Peter had preached. [snip] This internal evidence, if it does not actually prove the traditional view regarding the Petrine origin of the Second Gospel, is altogether consistent with it and tends strongly to confirm it.

Luke (http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09420a.htm)
The internal evidence may be briefly summarized as follows:

* The author of Acts was a companion of Saint Paul, namely, Saint Luke; and
* the author of Acts was the author of the Gospel.

John (http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08438a.htm#III)
No short snippet could adequately summarize the article - I suggest reading it for yourself if interested.

Phil_Stein

04-08-2006, 03:12 PM

Tom - I don't think I've presented my discussion here from a particular perspective of faith. In fact, I've expressed the limitations of my knowledge from my earliest post in this thread. Certainly, I have a set of personal spiritual beliefs (as, presumably do you and others in this discussion), but we can certainly discuss the issues in a non-faith based manner.

But you and others have made authoritative statements here without any particular evidence of your own authority, nor reference to external authorities (save runesword's link, and the reference to a couple of Catholic teachers, both of which I respond to above), nor for that matter, by actually discussing the specific points as to why some feel that the conventional authorship is valid or not valid.

And again, if you merely stated that some scholars doubt the traditional gospel authorships, and you subscribe to those scholars views, I think that would change the character of the discussion. But to argue that there is no serious scholarly debate on the issue at all is a very strong statement, and one that you should expect to be challenged on. Please prove your case (or even present any evidence) before accusing me of being the one burying my head in the sand.

TomChick

04-08-2006, 04:21 PM

Please prove your case (or even present any evidence) before accusing me of being the one burying my head in the sand.

Fair enough. But first, you should realize that Googling stuff isn't going to present you with a very reliable overview of something as loaded as who wrote the Gospels. For instance, surely you realize that any Catholic Encyclopedia is going to have to delicately dance around the topic, even if Matt Keil's teachers were more forthright? It's a tricky issue (and a classic example of why I really don't care for theology).

You might want to start with a basic overview like the Harper's Bible Commentary. It's an excellent and accessible collection of Biblical scholarship, and there's a great introduction to the Gospels as a whole, as well as introductions to each book and exhaustive textual and historical analysis. It's a tough, fair, respectable, and impartial collaboration of nearly 100 teachers and academics. It's what I regularly used in divinity school and what I still refer to from time to time today.

I see that there's a 2000 edition going for $30 on Amazon (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0060655488/sr=1-1/qid=1144538220/ref=pd_bbs_1/102-1891872-5580100?%5Fencoding=UTF8&s=books). I'm sure you can also find it at your local library if you just want to read over the bits specific to the Gospels.

But just to reiterate what I've said before, from an academic perspective, the question has long been settled: the writers of the Gospels are clearly not the Apostles whose names appear on those books. Barring some new evidence, the only significant dissent you're going to find is from crackpots, religious leaders with an agenda, and the fringe.

-Tom

runesword forger

04-08-2006, 05:01 PM

First, you may not be trying to bait anyone with your terminology, but it certainly comes across that way. Anyways....

I'm not sure why defining scholarly as peer-reviewed academic journals is offensive to you. I'm not saying that faithful people writing apologetics are not intelligent or well-informed. I was trying to establish a definition for what I was claiming as "scholarly opinion."

Second, the article you link to does not seem tone neutral to me. To give one quick example: His section on Luke opens:

Wow - it's a double whammy - implying that this revisinionist account goes against the more reliable "eyewitness gospels". I can only assume the author is basing this on the preface to Luke.....

As far as Luke's motivations go, which they also contend was more oriented towards gentiles, I'd imagine it comes from different aspects of the text and what Luke chose to emphasize.

No mention of inaccuracy in previous eyewitness gospels. In fact, no actual mention of previous gospels, only "accounts".

I'm not sure where you're going with this. Luke quotes much of Mark word for word. Are you seriously suggesting that the author of Luke was unfamiliar with Mark?

A few sentences later, in the rather sparse overall analysis of Luke, he recounts a single theologian's speculation that Luke was a woman, on the thinnest of thin logic. Rather sensational, frankly, and leads me to be skeptical of the rest of his article.

Why is explaining Luke's unusual parallel stories, then mentioning that one scholar speculates that Luke was a woman, "sensational?"

I don't get this. The essay isn't putting this forward as solid fact. If anything, mentioning that it's one scholar's speculation makes it clear that it’s simply an interesting idea.

Unknown does not equal "Not Matthew Mark or Luke", it equals unknown. And I see nothing in the article to indicate that there is no debate on the subject - rather quite the contrary. And again, this is your link, and an article whose author, IMO, does not strike me as tone neutral to begin with.

Yes, unknown means unknown. And given the ancient world's tendency towards forgery -- which even the most orthodox of people concede, given that there are 30+ gospels -- there is no particular reason to identify the authors as apostles.

Phil_Stein

04-08-2006, 06:16 PM

I'm not sure why defining scholarly as peer-reviewed academic journals is offensive to you.
I haven't seen you or others demonstrate that the weight of the opinion of peer-reviewed journals is against traditional authorship, much less that ALL opinion of peer-reviewed journals is that way.

As far as Luke's motivations go, which they also contend was more oriented towards gentiles, I'd imagine it comes from different aspects of the text and what Luke chose to emphasize.

I'm not sure where you're going with this. Luke quotes much of Mark word for word. Are you seriously suggesting that the author of Luke was unfamiliar with Mark?

Why is explaining Luke's unusual parallel stories, then mentioning that one scholar speculates that Luke was a woman, "sensational?"

I don't get this. The essay isn't putting this forward as solid fact. If anything, mentioning that it's one scholar's speculation makes it clear that it’s simply an interesting idea.

The point of all of this is that it strikes me that the author of this article is not neutral. He mis-summarizes the introduction of Luke in a key way. In no way does the opening of Luke claim that previous gospels lacked accuracy. That's either a fairly big error, or a sign of bias. Similarly, that within a rather short piece on Luke, he brings up a rather sensational story with little backing furthers my opinion that this article author is probably not neutral.

Since it seems to me that your point is that all neutral parties share your opinion, I think pointing to signs that the source you've presented is not neutral is highly relevant.

Yes, unknown means unknown. And given the ancient world's tendency towards forgery -- which even the most orthodox of people concede, given that there are 30+ gospels -- there is no particular reason to identify the authors as apostles.
Well, again, your source, which you picked, and which, to me seems not-neutral, presents two summaries re: each gospel, one of which matches conventional authorship, and the other says that the authorship is unknown (and your source does not explicitly choose between the sides).

Now, going further, you're disregarding one half of what your source presents, then, with the other half, you're taking a BIG step which your source (possibly biased in your favor anyways), doesn't take himself, suggesting that 'unknown' = likely forged. Forgive me if I have a hard time following and accepting this convoluted proof for your contention "None of the gospels are thought to be written by their namesakes.", or for Tom's more radical contention that "you won't find anyone [conventional academics] seriously suggesting that any of the Gospels were written by their respective Apostles. "

Troy S Goodfellow

04-08-2006, 06:21 PM

I'm not sure what you mean by a "neutral" source. Are you accusing the authors of being anti-religious, anti-Christian or simply anti-attributing the Gospels to their namesakes?

Troy

Phil_Stein

04-08-2006, 06:41 PM

Troy - there are plenty of authors out there who strongly attack aspects of 'conventional Christianity'. To the extent that they do so grounded in scholarly evidence or at least sound reasoning, then it's a valid subject for debate. But when their writing is inflammatory and/or distorts facts, then you must approach it with the same kind of skepticism as you would an apologist who distorts the facts in favor of orthodox Christianity.

Am I utterly convinced that the author in question is heavily biased? No, but the little section on Luke certainly seemed suspicious to me, for the reasons I outlined.

Phil_Stein

04-11-2006, 07:15 AM

So I stopped off at the local bookstore yesterday to follow up on Tom's suggestion.

They didn't have the Harper's commentary, but they did have the Oxford commentary, which, I'm guessing is comparable. Very lengthy single volume commentary, apparently all written by academics, with plenty of academic cites and such.

(I didn't end up buying it, so I don't have it at hand as I write this, and I apologize in advance if my summary below mangles anything)

Summary:
There was a lengthy article on the New Testament in general, tying in it's writing, adoption/formation with the history and issues of the 1st century church. Pretty interesting read, though it only dealt with issues of authorship somewhat tangentially.

There were also individual articles on each of the four gospels, including some bits on authorship and dating. BTW, both the overall summary and the individual gospel author articles, were, I believe, mostly/all written by different academics - so there were somewhat different viewpoints and tones throughout.

As for what they said about the authorships: It was not as Tom described - universal rejection of traditional authorships. In fact, things were rather a mixed bag. Most/all of the articles laid out several possible theories for the development of their respective gospel, each theory advocated to greater or lesser degree by specific academics and/or the academic community as a whole. In each case, the author had a favored theory, but IIRC all the authors were rather hesitant to stamp their theory as 'gospel' (yeah, yeah, the puns been made too many times in this thread already).

In each case, the 'traditional' authorship was one of the theories. IIRC, only the Mark article came out relatively strongly against 'tradition'. For Matthew, IIRC, the author's personal opinion was that while it's unlikely that Matthew wrote the final form of the gospel, that it was possible/likely that Matthew wrote more of a 'sayings' gospel, which a later editor combined with narrative bits from Mark into the final form of Matthew as we have today.

The Luke article author said that the older theory that Luke had to have been written by a doctor wasn't correct, and mentioned that the Luke/Acts author was not in complete agreement with Paul's epistles on certain chronology and theology, but also stated that this might simply reflect different viewpoints between Luke and Paul (i.e. just because they were companions doesn't mean Luke saw everything exactly the same way Paul did). Overall, IIRC, the Luke article author neither particularly affirmed nor disagreed with the traditional authorship

The John article author believed that John was not written all at one time, but probably a sort of first draft, edited/revised one or more later times, written by somebody in the Johanine community - either John himself or a disciple of John recording/recounting John's version of things.

Again, my summaries are, IIRC, the article favored theories, but all articles recounted multiple theories. Hopefully I've captured these theories, as written by the article authors, correctly, but there were a lot of dense theories, and I was reading this yesterday and not taking notes, so I may have mangled something(s) above. In general, most of these authors seemed rather reluctant to say anything definite - there's not a lot of direct evidence on these issues - there's a lot of reliance on inferences, and it's rather possible to read the same thing and draw rather different inferences from it.

Finally, I would return to my original statement - if you're interested, do your own research from multiple sources, and draw your own conclusions.

And in particular, I don't think, for the most part, this is a topic where you have to take anybody's word for it. Most of the arguments and theories are rather accessible to the lay reader, with the exception of those dealing with nuances of Greek grammar and such (and even there, there's disagreement amongst various authors and scholars).

Steve Canyon

04-11-2006, 09:25 AM

I've found this discussion interesting. I dug out our New American Catholic Study Bible, which has a lot of reading guide stuff in the front. This Bible didn't really offer an opinion on who wrote the Gospels. Interestingly it refered to both generic "gospel writers" and occasionally used references like "Mark says" or "Matthew says." I suppose you could interpret that however you want. I never really thought about this question much, but I have a vague sense that we were told (in grade school) that the apostles wrote the gospels. They also taught us that the punishment for masterbation was hariy palms, so go figure. :)

Moore

04-11-2006, 10:55 AM

So Jesus basically committed suicide?

Good thing he wasnt catholic!

TomChick

04-11-2006, 11:08 AM

BTW, both the overall summary and the individual gospel author articles, were, I believe, mostly/all written by different academics - so there were somewhat different viewpoints and tones throughout.

Yes, on a variety of issues, that's the norm. However, as you found, that's not the case on "traditional authorship". And it's no surprise that the people who write about Biblical scholarship are, well, academics. That's kind of how that works. :)

At any rate, Oxford is going to be a bit dense for anyone who's not in academia, but it'll do. Harper's is much more layman-oriented.

In each case, the 'traditional' authorship was one of the theories.

Yes, it's one of the "theories". The earth being flat is also a "theory", as are Elvis faking his death and UFOs building the pyramids.

My point all along is that there's no credible evidence to support that any of the Gospels were written by their namesakes. Don't you think it's telling that none of the writers in your Oxford commentary supported traditional authorship? The timeline, the content, and the historical context simply don't support that any of the Apostles wrote any of the books of the Gospels. You're beating your head against a very simple tenet of Biblical scholarship.

-Tom

TomChick

04-11-2006, 11:11 AM

Most of the arguments and theories are rather accessible to the lay reader, with the exception of those dealing with nuances of Greek grammar and such (and even there, there's disagreement amongst various authors and scholars).

By the way, Phil, traditional authorship requires that you explain how a bunch of uneducated Aramaic-speaking fishermen knew Greek. Because the Gospels weren't written in Aramaic. :)

That's the sort of common sense stuff I was hoping you'd discover if you decided to look into the issue.

-Tom

Rimbo

04-11-2006, 11:18 AM

Phil_Stein

04-11-2006, 11:21 AM

Yes, it's one of the "theories". The earth being flat is also a "theory", as are Elvis faking his death and UFOs building the pyramids.

My point all along is that there's no credible evidence to support that any of the Gospels were written by their namesakes. Don't you think it's telling that none of the writers in your Oxford commentary supported traditional authorship? The timeline, the content, and the historical context simply don't support that any of the Apostles wrote any of the books of the Gospels. You're beating your head against a very simple tenet of Biblical scholarship.

-Tom

Tom, either you're twisting what I said, or I didn't say it clearly enough.

The traditional authorships were implied as plausible theories, not 'flat earth' theories. Different scholars in the Oxford commentary had different opinions on the likelihood of different theories, including traditional authorship. But none of the theories were flat earth, non-credible theories.

And again, from all that I've read (including the Oxford commentaries), I just don't get anywhere close to your position on there being no evidence for traditional authorship, and significant evidence against it. Rather the contrary - there's a bit of circumstantial evidence on each side, and it's all a bit weak. Which isn't terribly surprising for 2000 year old books of which we don't have the original copies, etc.

Phil_Stein

04-11-2006, 11:28 AM

By the way, Phil, traditional authorship requires that you explain how a bunch of uneducated Aramaic-speaking fishermen knew Greek. Because the Gospels weren't written in Aramaic. :)

That's the sort of common sense stuff I was hoping you'd discover if you decided to look into the issue.

-Tom

Tom, have you even read these commentaries yourself? Greek culture, and language, was widespread in the Eastern Mediterranean in the first century. While the primary language of the apostles was Aramaic, there's no reason why some wouldn't have known Greek, or learned it in the course of their evangelism (Indeed, John 12:20-22 discusses Greeks asking the apostle Philip to see Jesus - it's a fair bet that the dialogue occurred in Greek, not Aramaic). Only two of the gospels are credited directly to Apostles. Matthew may have originally written his gospel in Aramaic (there's a 2nd century reference to it being in Aramaic, IIRC), and then it was translated by him, or more likely someone else (in fact, I mentioned this as one of the scholarly theories a few posts up).

John wrote his the latest, 40+ years after the crucifiction. You consider it impossible that John:
1) Knew some Greek to begin with, or
2) Learned Greek in the intervening 40 years, when, you know, he was traveling around the mediterranean evangelizing to Greek congregations or
3) His gospel was recorded by a Greek-speaking disciple of his

Really Tom, who's sticking their head in the sand now?

I'm not saying there's evidence for the above, but there's not evidence against it either, and it's plausible enough, even though, again, there's no strong proof one way or the other (as to whether, say, John spoke/wrote Greek late in life).

TomChick

04-11-2006, 11:44 AM

Podunk

04-11-2006, 11:51 AM

FYI, regarding the online Catholic Encyclopedia: (http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/) it's a transcription of a 1917 printing of the Catholic Encyclopedia. It is not a bad resource for getting into the theological ballpark, but in many cases the information it provides does not correspond to current thinking in the Church. Be particularly wary of entries that have to do with history or biblical scholarship, since those fields have both advanced a heck of a long way in the last 90 years.

Not trying to pick on you, Phil. I've just seen links to the Catholic Encyclopedia pop up in similar discussions and it's very easy to mistake it for a current document.

Troy S Goodfellow

04-11-2006, 12:03 PM

Here's a very good website (http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/alphabetical.html) that quotes a number of sources on a wide range of early Christian documents.

The site notes that the scholarly consensus (http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/matthew.html) argues against the Apostle Matthew being the author of his gospel. The other Gospel accounts mostly focus on the issues of dating them precisely. The article on John is a lot of fun.

Troy

Phil_Stein

04-11-2006, 12:12 PM

Phil, the issue of the Gospels being written in Greek by people who spoke Aramaic was just one point. There are others. And you're going to have to do similar academic gymnastics to get around them. Such as explaining how the Apostles managed to live so long, how they anticipated things they couldn't possibly have known, and how they each managed to write as if they were, in fact, several different people. And then there's the Synoptic Problem, which was such a problem we actually capitalized it. Matthew, Mark, and Luke were often copied almost directly from Q, a document we no longer have. Why were the Apostles, dudes who knew Jesus first-hand and wouldn't need to refer to other sources, working from an earlier document?

These are the issues that I was hoping you'd discover if you looked into the matter yourself instead of taking my word for it. Instead, you've coming at me with this nonsense about how traditional authorship hasn't been disproved, so therefore it's still on the table.

I don't have an Oxford Bible Commentary with me, but I'd love for you to cite where it supports traditional authorship, not where it mentions that it's one of many theories.

Look, I'm not interested in slugging it out with you, particularly since it seems you're not laying all your cards on the table. This is particularly telling:

That's simply not how it works, Phil. You don't get to propose a theory and then place the burden of proof on anyone who disagrees with you. Particularly when there's already evidence supporting the other side.

-Tom

Alright - briefly:

Apostles living so long - Please... by most date estimates the gospels were written well within the realistic lifetimes of people who had been young men at the time of the Crucifiction. Only John is even a potential issue, and only if you take a very late date for it's writing. Remember, Socrates was vigorous at age 70, only dying when forced to. St. Augustine, in the 5th century, lived to age 76 and was writing and debating up until at least 2 years before his death.

Anticipated things...: Assuming you're referring to "Not one stone will be left upon another" - which some have said was a prediction of the Temple's destruction, then there are 3 possibilities - take your pick:
1) Mark wrote after 70 AD and knew about the Temple's destruction
2) Jesus was making a longer-term prediction and it's a coincidence this happened sooner rather than later
or, shockingly enough
3) Jesus predicted correctly. Imagine that.

The Synoptic problem - really only an issue for one gospel - take your pick of Mark or Matthew. Luke effectively states in his preface that he's relying on other sources (including, among others, presumably Q/Mark and or Matthew). As for Mark/Matthew's inter-relationship, and how/if Q fits into this - you're right, it's a very extended discussion, and no, I don't want to beat that bush either. But again, there are all kinds of credible possibilities to explain the inter-relationships - I'm sure you've encountered many of them too.

Tom, why must the default position be that apostolic authorship is false? Isn't it rather plausible that some of the apostles (or their close peers) would have wanted to record their recollections of the man they devoted their lives to? If falsely attributed gospels had circulated during their lives, don't you think some of these guys may have objected?

TomChick

04-11-2006, 12:28 PM

Tom, why must the default position be that apostolic authorship is false?

Phil, I don't mean this disrespectfully, but do you understand how science works? There is no "default position". The evidence is considered, and whatever it best supports is embraced as the most plausible explanation.

That's how Biblical scholarship works. In cases like the authorship of the Gospels, it's pretty much settled. In other situations, like the history of ancient Israel, the stories of the patriarchs, and Jesus' actual historical context, there's still plenty of wiggle room. But as I said a while ago, the conventional wisdom is that none of the Apostles wrote the Gospels. There is no reliable evidence to support this.

Seriously, please cite from your Oxford Bible Commentary which of the writers supports Apostolic authorship.

However, I'm guessing this isn't a matter of science for you, so I'm regretting taking this path. I'd just as soon we backtrack to my first couple of posts and take it from there.

-Tom

Phil_Stein

04-11-2006, 01:13 PM

Hopefully, this link (http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0198755007/ref=sib_rdr_next1_961/103-0228928-0037413?%5Fencoding=UTF8&keywords=gospel%20john%20author&p=S0RK&twc=61&checkSum=w0cLaQiTUVcWYaoJIvPr8tYGxy%2BwQBomwLdhB2j 7UbU%3D#reader-page)works (using Amazon's "See Inside" feature), for Oxford's John section:

My own view is that the main author, whom I call 'the evangelist', tries to unite his community by transmitting the testimony of the beloved disciple. This person is presented in such a way that the reader who knows the synoptic tradition can identify him with John the son of Zebedee. Historically, it is possible that somebody other than the apostle John was the mediator, but the evangelist wants us to identify the beloved disciple with the apostle. This is quite in agreement with an old tradition we find in Irenaeus (cite). The final version of the gospel was probably produced about 90-100 A in Ephesus.

A little vague, but by my read, he's in agreement with the old Iranaeus tradition, and puts the authorship on John himself or somebody close to him.

For Luke (http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0198755007/ref=sib_rdr_prev2_ex924/103-0228928-0037413?%5Fencoding=UTF8&keywords=gospel%20john%20author&p=S0QJ&twc=61&checkSum=VBdM6bDYMoeKBE1E6NOboHsEKH45phgaUk3sHMPQ4 gQ%3D#reader-page), there's no clear cut quote - the author doesn't render a really clear judgment either way. Up front he says
Questions about Luke's sources must remain unresolved.
Then, on the facing column, there's a lengthy (and somewhat ambiguous) discussion of Luke, his relationship to Paul, etc.

Here's the section on Mark (http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0198755007/ref=sib_vae_pg_886/103-0228928-0037413?%5Fencoding=UTF8&keywords=gospel%20john%20author&p=S0PH&twc=61&checkSum=RLjOH4IA55t336wifgdPb29wTwlkbvi32JnEQtk%2 FmUA%3D#reader-page). As I said earlier - this article is the most skeptical of it's author, though for that matter, there's no flat refutation of Mark (understood to be a companion of Peter)'s authorship - rather, phrases like "hard to establish", and "uncertain", concluding that the link between Mark and Peter is "probably part of a second-century attempt to give the gospel more status."

The Matthew commentary (http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0198755007/ref=sib_rdr_prev2_ex844/103-0228928-0037413?%5Fencoding=UTF8&keywords=gospel%20john%20author&p=S0OB&twc=61&checkSum=pd2s24nAP1Wt6LEwVxtEuZkagz%2FvUtAdjfB6WCJ 1Ums%3D#reader-page) doubts the tradition of Matthew being the author of the Greek version, but amongst possibilities, suggests
Papias' tradition might have originally referred to an early version of lost sayings (source known as Q) and then, when Q disappeared, have been connected with Matthew. It was common enough for a document to carry the name of the author of one of its sources

TomChick

04-11-2006, 01:28 PM

When my friends and I are arguing about something, a goof we'll sometimes do to each other is to respond to someone's argument with 'You just proved my point!' If you say that convincingly enough and just sort of let it sit, you're sure to throw off your opponent no matter what he's just said.

However, this is one of those times when I can actually say it completely in earnest: Phil, you just proved my point.

As I could have told you without looking at it, the Oxford Bible Commentary is clear: the conventional wisdom is that none of the Gospel were written by the Apostles. Every single one of the pages you linked to clearly says so.

BTW, I still think Harper's is a bit more accessible.

-Tom

Phil_Stein

04-11-2006, 01:39 PM

Please point to me where the John and Luke pages say they were clearly not written by their traditional authors.

Ryan Markel

04-11-2006, 01:46 PM

As a historical-grammatical exegete, I would argue that modern Biblical scholarship isn't (kind of like how friendly fire isn't), but I can clearly see how that's a losing argument already.

Arguments for late dating of Scriptural texts are just as limited as those arguing for early dating.

Troy S Goodfellow

04-11-2006, 01:46 PM

Please point to me where the John and Luke pages say they were clearly not written by their traditional authors.

Could you point to anywhere that it says they clearly were?

The John section you quote says that it is likely someone wants to invoke John the Evangelist. It is about "transmitting testimony" of the evangelist, not John writing it himself.

Saying that authorship "is unresolved" does not mean that the Luke tradition is necessarily on an equal level with other scholarly theories. The whole "clearly a doctor" theory was debunked years and years ago, so the whole Divine Physician tradition is out the window.

In a way, all the authorship squabbles are unresolved in that we don't have a royalty check from Random House with the Gospel writers' names on them.

Troy

Phil_Stein

04-11-2006, 02:05 PM

Troy - re John, I don't know - my reading of the above quote (and, to a lesser extent, accompanying text in the link) is that the author thinks John the most likely author, and that it is "possible" (i.e. certainly less than probable), that somebody else acted as the mediator (i.e. by my reading - the recorder of the book). The reference to Iraneaus is presumably to this
Iranaeus, again, explained that John “published a gospel during his residence at Ephesus of
Asia.”

As for Luke "is unresolved" - certainly, it's not on an equal level, with, say, The Law of Gravity - none of this is. For that matter, the (Oxford) arguments against don't express certainty either - again, the Mark article is the strongest against traditional authorship, but he couches his language in wiggle words, too.

I've never said anything in this discussion is certain, rather, it's been those on the other side who've said "the Gospels in their current form certainly weren't written by the Apostles", "you won't find anyone seriously suggesting that any of the Gospels were written by their respective Apostles." "the scholarly view is that there is no reason to think that the gospels are written by their namesakes. " (emph added)

Seems to me that places the burden of this discussion on them to back up their statements, not on me to prove to modern scientific standards that the traditional gospel authorships are categorically, undeniably accurate (a claim I certainly haven't made or come close to making in this discussion, nor would I make that claim)

Troy S Goodfellow

04-11-2006, 02:08 PM

Seems to me that places the burden of this discussion on them to back up their statements, not on me to prove to modern scientific standards that the traditional gospel authorships are categorically, undeniably true (a claim I certainly haven't made or come close to making in this discussion, nor would I make that claim)

OK. How about a place where someone seriously offers the traditional alternative explanation as a co-equal possibility with the speculative scholarship. Not someplace where they simply say "We don't know, but it dates to sometime in the late 1st century."

Because saying "we don't know" is not the same as seriously saying that Luke could have written Luke.

Troy

Phil_Stein

04-11-2006, 02:20 PM

Troy, read the Luke article in full (or at least the pages before and after the link I provide), and I think you'll see that while the author never makes a flat statement that "traditional" Luke is (or isn't) the author, after a brief discussion, he proceeds as if the author is Luke (or at least someone fitting rather closely to the traditional view of Luke).

Is there a royalty statement from Random House? No, but the closest I perceive to a "challenge" to traditional Luke authorship (in this article) is section D-3, raising the issue of Paul and Luke's relationship. There's not much detail on this question though, and sections D-1, D-2, D-4, D-5, D-6 and D-7 all attest, at least mildly, to traditionally ascribed characteristics of Luke.

TomChick

04-11-2006, 02:27 PM

So you're conceding Matthew and Mark already? Cool, we're half way there. And you've left me the easy ones!

Firstly, I'm not sure that you're aware of this, but Luke wasn't one of Jesus' disciples. No one's even arguing that. Not even the Gospels. His name doesn't appear among the list of the 12. Whoever Luke is supposed to be, he never met Jesus!

So the question is whether it was written by a companion of Paul's, which is what has been traditionally inferred from some epistles. Your link to the Oxford Bible Commentary says that appears unlikely. You've already referenced Irenaeus, so I'm surprised you don't know more about how the name Luke ended up at the top of that particular Gospel.

The stuff on John that you admitted is vague clearly indicates that Eric Franklin, a profressor from Oxford, doesn't support that John, son of Zebedee, is the author. He calls the writer "the evangelist" instead of "John" for a reason.

John is a great Gospel and it's by far the most creative and literary. I don't know where to begin, but arguing that John was written by one of Jesus' inner circle as a historical reality rather than a literary device -- and a great one at that! -- is clearly a misguided effort. The whole Beloved Disciple=John, son of Zebedee, which is what I presume you're arguing, isn't even interally supported in Scripture.

Phil, this is all very basic stuff.

-Tom

Phil_Stein

04-11-2006, 02:57 PM

Re: Matthew and Mark - again, see my comments (in regard to the Oxford articles on them) above.

Re: Luke - You mean Luke wasn't one of the Apostles? Next you're going to tell me that Santa Claus wasn't present at Jesus' birth.

There are 7 paragraphs dealing with who "Luke" is (D1-D7), Four of them (D2, D3, D4, D5) deal primarily with Luke's relationship with Paul. One of those in a negative sense, three in a positive sense. How you get from that to the characterization of the relationship as "unlikely" seems rather a stretch to me (and not in keeping with the article)

As for John, I don't see a reference to Eric Franklin here - the article appears to be written by Rene Kieffer. Eric wrote the Luke article but doesn't appear to be even a source in the John article. Reading the 'conclusion' paragraph (B-3, as quoted above), and trying to infer a bit on the waffle words (which, again all 4 gospel articles have), it strikes me that he regards John as the most likely person to be the "evangelist", though it's "possible" that someone else was the mediator.

Again, none of these articles say "It is 100% certain that X is the case". All four others waffle, leaving open alternative possibilities. If I were writing the articles, I'd do the same.

I think the way you've read them and characterized them reveals a bit about your frame of mind going in. I imagine you feel the same way about me. At this point, we're into arguing not about the subleties of the gospels themselves, but the meaning and subleties of articles about the gospels. Again, I'd say it's best for folks to read the linked articles (and other material they may find), and reach their own conclusions.

TomChick

04-11-2006, 03:09 PM

I may have misattributed the author of the Luke entry to the John entry, so you got me there. But the point I made remains.

Again, none of these articles say "It is 100% certain that X is the case". All four others waffle, leaving open alternative possibilities.

Good lord, Phil, is that what you're looking for? Because if you could have just stated up front that you're going to believe whatever you want to believe until someone concludes otherwise 100%, then you could have saved us all a lot of typing.

The fact of the matter is that you're ignoring evidence that the Gospels weren't written by their namesakes. No one's 100% certain who actually wrote them, but we are pretty certain who didn't write them.

I think the more relevant discussion is why it matters so much to you that each Gospel was written by Its namesake. I would submit that's the far more important question you should be asking yourself.

-Tom

Phil_Stein

04-11-2006, 03:23 PM

Tom, again you misrepresent.

The reason I mentioned lack of certainty in the scholarly statements is because, well, first, you claimed there was, earlier in the discussion, and second, because you want to have it both ways. When the Oxford article authors seem to be most strongly supportive of traditional authorship (Luke and John), you latch onto the waffle words as proof positive that they're really denying traditional authorship. And in the articles where the Oxford authors are more opposed to traditional authorship (Matthew and especially Mark), you dismiss the waffle words out of hand.

TomChick

04-11-2006, 03:38 PM

Waffle words? The fact that most scholars don't write in simple terms doesn't mean they're using "waffle words".

Phil, I don't know why you insist on being obtuse about this, but there is no serious scholarship supporting that the Gospels were written by their namesakes. Now you're mischaracterizing stuff you just read as "strongly supportive of traditional authorship", when it says no such thing.

Since you've accepted that you're wrong about Mark and Matthew, I have two quick questions: Are you assuming the author of the Gospel of John is the John referenced as the son of Zebedee? And are you assuming the author of Luke is some dude who hung around with Paul? Because once I can nail down just what you're saying, I can make this pretty easy for both of us.

-Tom

Reeko

04-11-2006, 08:04 PM

...arguing that John was written by one of Jesus' inner circle as a historical reality rather than a literary device -- and a great one at that! -- is clearly a misguided effort. The whole Beloved Disciple=John, son of Zebedee, which is what I presume you're arguing, isn't even interally supported in Scripture.

Coupla things...

John 21:20 Peter turned and saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following them, the one who had been reclining at table close to him and had said, "Lord, who is it that is going to betray you?" 21 When Peter saw him, he said to Jesus, "Lord, what about this man?" 22 Jesus said to him, "If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow me!" 23 So the saying spread abroad among the brothers that this disciple was not to die; yet Jesus did not say to him that he was not to die, but, "If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you?" 24 This is the disciple who is bearing witness about these things, and who has written these things, and we know that his testimony is true. 25 Now there are also many other things that Jesus did. Were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.

Whatever you make of the 21st chapter of John, whether you think that he wrote it himself, or his disciples later wrote it and slapped it on to the end, the internal evidence seems to say that the disciple actually wrote "these things." What does "these things" include? That's debatable. Even so, the internal evidence points to the beloved disciple = son of Zebedee = author of *some* of the gospel account that bears his name.

As far as the lack of education of the disciples, I don't know if we can just assume that they were all a bunch of yokels. Look at the writings of Paul. He was a highly religious man, fluent in Koine Greek, and able to construct some pretty complex arguments. He was a contemporary of Jesus. How did he get so educated? Well, he was wealthy enough to be a Roman citizen, so we can assume that perhaps his family had paid for an education for him. Why can't we assume the same for the other disciples? Matthew was a tax collector and wealthy. Zebedee had hired servants, why not such an education for his sons, too? John the Baptist was the son of a Levite priest - not impovershed.

And as far as scientific analysis from people outside of a faith perspective, I can't see how this would even work. A bunch of people, who by definition don't believe any of the supernatural recording - and a limited amount of the preaching - and say what is and what is not valid? Tom Wright in his book "The Resurrection of the Son of God" said (I'm paraphrasing) that approaching everything with a hermeneutic of suspicion requires an attitude of credulity toward whatever other theory gets advanced.

But what would I know? I grew up in Indian Bayou, Louisiana :P

Enidigm

04-11-2006, 08:23 PM

And as far as scientific analysis from people outside of a faith perspective, I can't see how this would even work. A bunch of people, who by definition don't believe any of the supernatural recording - and a limited amount of the preaching - and say what is and what is not valid? Tom Wright in his book "The Resurrection of the Son of God" said (I'm paraphrasing) that approaching everything with a hermeneutic of suspicion requires an attitude of credulity toward whatever other theory gets advanced.

Not to be argumentative but isn't this a simply a more sophisticated variety of the old classic circular reasoning; of the "God exists, the bible is infallible, the bible is the word of God, therefore God exists" variety?

Saying you can't analyse the Bible because it is in portion or completely inspired/supernatural is a position meant to end investigation. Or that you can't investigate the veracity, date or authority of elements without approaching them with some comprehension and appreciation of their sacred nature - ie., out of a position of (or at least recognition of) faith, is an assertion best left to the domain of saturday morning breakfast and fellowship groups. All imo :)

TomChick

04-11-2006, 08:35 PM

Yeah, I love that little twist at the end, Reeko. Cool coda. It doesn't necessarily have anything to do with John, the son of Zebedee, however. And don't you think it odd that there's a first person plural reference, though? "We know"? Whoa. A little editorial commentary, huh?

In the Harper's Bible Commentary I just looked up, Dwight Moody Smith from Duke's seminary says that some of the context provided by the Dead Sea Scrolls did make it more plausible that John was written in Palestine earlier than usually thought; it's normally regarded as a later Hellenistic text written after Christianity had sort of moved out into the world. This could lend more support to folks interested in suggesting that maybe the actual Apostle wrote it. But unless anything has changed since I studied this stuff, it's just too unlikely that John predates the Synoptics, which are drawn from Q, the closest thing we know of to a first-hand account.

But to keep things clear for Phil who doesn't want to take my word for it, I'll cite the Harper's commentary, attributed to Philip Schuler at McMurray College in Texas:

That John the Apostle wrote the Fourth Gospel is by no means certain...the Gospel bears no signature, nor is the author identified therein. Furthermore, significant differences between the portrayals of Jesus in the Fourth Gospel and in the Synoptics must be kept in mind. Attempts to link John the Apostle with "the beloved disciple" (John 13:23; 19:26; 20:2; 21:7; 20-24), though not impossible, are nevertheless conjectural. The situation is further complicated by the relationship between "the beloved disciple" and the unnamed "other" disciple in John 1:40 and 18:15-16. Similiar difficulties surround attempts to link the author of the three letters of John to John the Apostle. Although tradition has identified the John of Revelation with John the Apostle, many scholars seriously question this association.

There you go. Not as hard and fast as the other Gospels, but I maintain it reflects the conventional wisdom.

A bunch of people, who by definition don't believe any of the supernatural recording - and a limited amount of the preaching - and say what is and what is not valid?

As I tried to indicate before, that's an entirely different conversation. If you want to look at Scripture as a literature with a historical context, you approach it a certain way. And if you want to look at it as sacred or divine or somehow divorced from its context, that's cool. But you can't change the terms of the conversation mid-stream. :)

I've made no bones about the fact that I'm only talking about the former.

-Tom

shift6

04-11-2006, 08:51 PM

Tom, what kind of classes and subjects go into a degree in divinity? Genuine question since we're kind of near the topic. I'm just curious.

TomChick

04-11-2006, 09:01 PM

Well, it depends on the degree. My program was pretty liberal in that we could sort of assemble a DIY program as long as our advisor cleared it. It let you focus on what you liked (Biblical study, in my case) and avoid what you didn't like (in my case, theology, modern trends like feminism and environmentalism in religion, ministerial stuff).

I managed to shoehorn in some pretty fascinating classes, as well as some entirely irrelevant stuff. I had a class on Media and Religion, which was pretty silly, because I was fascinated with a televangelist named Robert Tilton. What that had to do with my degree was exactly nothing.

But I vividly remember a class on genocide taught by a visiting scholar who was a Holocaust survivor. Many of us didn't realize that until the day he sort of sighed and said, 'Okay, for today, I'm going to talk about what many of you are wondering about.' He then told us this incredibly harrowing story about how he got out of Germany as a child, but lost most of his family. Again, that has absolutely nothing to do with my degree, but I'm glad I was there.

-Tom

Reeko

04-11-2006, 09:15 PM

Not to be argumentative but isn't this a simply a more sophisticated variety of the old classic circular reasoning; of the "God exists, the bible is infallible, the bible is the word of God, therefore God exists" variety?

I don't think that's what I'm saying. You *can* analyze the Bible, if you want to. Analyze it all day. Examine the historical setting. Examine the genres used. Examine the grammar. Examine the vocabulary. Question authorship. Heck, tradition used to dictate that Paul wrote the Book of Hebrews. Most faith-driven scholars looks at it now and shrug their shoulders. Question dates, places, names, etc. Here's something to chew on. The story of the woman caught in adultery, where Jesus says "Let he who has no sin cast the first stone." It doesn't belong in the Bible. The earliest manuscripts we have don't include it in John's Gospel. Other ancient manuscripts place it somewhere in Luke (I think). It doesn't fit in there stylistically or thematically. Doesn't mean this didn't happen, just that it doesn't belong there. The same thing could be said about the ending of Mark.

What I *don't* get is why anyone outside of the orbit of faith would bother with it. If the main thought running through someone's head when they read it is, "this is all colossal bullshit," what makes them so interested in figuring out who did or did not write this book? Without the supernatural events recorded, the whole book is pointless. You can get good moral teaching anywhere. Even Dr. Phil can get you by if rules for life is what you're after. It's the events going on in the text that give meaning to the other truths.

This is why, when it comes to the Gospel of Judas, I dismiss it out of hand. The Gospel of Judas, if it is true to its gnostic reputation, will claim that Jesus was rather a demigod whose human flesh was a prison. It will claim that Jesus only came to pass on secret knowledge so that people could escape the material prison that we live in because the evil god of the Old Testament created it.

Sorry. That just doesn't match what the apostles taught regarding Jesus. His body was truly him just as your body is truly you. The material world is not an evil god's prison to be escaped, but the good creation that you were created to inhabit. Jesus' death on the cross was not his escape from the Father. Rather, it was the way that a sinful world is reconciled to the Father. When Christ returns, everyone who believes will also be raised up again just like Christ was, in a real physical body created to inhabit a new physical earth. How do I know this? This is what has always been taught in the churches, from the very beginning. This teaching is the basis by which the original books of the Bible were accepted into canon.

It's not that I believe things are true because they are in the Bible. That's fundamentalism. I believe that things are in the Bible because they are true. That point may be lost on you, but I am coming from a position of faith. We are going to see things differently.

Edited to clarify to whom I was responding

Reeko

04-11-2006, 09:37 PM

It doesn't necessarily have anything to do with John, the son of Zebedee, however.

I'll bite. Why not? To whom is it referring? Who, then, is the beloved disciple and why in the world would tradition attribute it to John?

And don't you think it odd that there's a first person plural reference, though? "We know"? Whoa. A little editorial commentary, huh?
Sure. And Moses didn't talk about himself in the third person, either. It's okay. I can handle it.

And if you want to look at it as sacred or divine or somehow divorced from its context, that's cool.

You seriously underestimate the scholarship among believers.

TomChick

04-11-2006, 09:45 PM

What I *don't* get is why anyone outside of the orbit of faith would bother with it. If the main thought running through someone's head when they read it is, "this is all colossal bullshit," what makes them so interested in figuring out who did or did not write this book? Without the supernatural events recorded, the whole book is pointless.

Well, I think you're defining the orbit of faith far too narrowly, mischaracterizing Biblical scholarship ("This is all colossal bullshit"?), and selling Scripture short.

That point may be lost on you, but I am coming from a position of faith. We are going to see things differently.

Which is why it can be hard to have this conversation without both parties fessing up about where they're coming from. I think Phil has been pretty disingenuous about being intellectually curious when he's approaching this from a position of faith. I hope I'm wrong, but I regret getting involved seeing how it's turned out.

But it doesn't mean we can't all talk. In fact, we should talk since we share a love of Scripture. It's a big Book. Sheesh, it's the biggest Book! There's room for all kinds of perspectives. I mean, if a Baptist and a Catholic can talk about Scripture, you and I should as well. Who cares if we see things differently? In fact, isn't that all the more reason to talk?

-Tom

Reeko

04-11-2006, 10:04 PM

I think you're defining the orbit of faith far too narrowly

I think you and I have just made a breakthrough. When I say I take a position of faith, I mean that I view these gospel accounts, and I believe that what the authors are writing actually happened. I believe that Jesus actually walked on water - not floated on an ice cube. I believe that Jesus actually fed a huge multitude of people with a few loaves of bread and a couple of normal sized fish. I believe that Jesus actually died on that cross and that he actually came back to life - not died and his teachings were then "resurrected."

What do you mean by faith?

Sidd_Budd

04-11-2006, 10:15 PM

What I *don't* get is why anyone outside of the orbit of faith would bother with [critically analyzing the Bible against historical evidence]. If the main thought running through someone's head when they read it is, "this is all colossal bullshit," what makes them so interested in figuring out who did or did not write this book? Without the supernatural events recorded, the whole book is pointless. You can get good moral teaching anywhere.
I think you are oversimplying people's motivations. Non-Christian folks can find the Bible fascinating. Some scholars might be curious and interested in tracing the historical development of all the great written works of the world's religions, regardless of their particular faith. Other scholars might be concerned that Christianity has, in the past, actively repressed secular critical inquiry and want to prevent that from happening again. Still others may be actively biased against Christianity.

There's a range of motivation out there. You can't simply equate a desire for critical analysis of Christian authorship to a global perception of the Bible as bullshit. I am not a Christian, and am skeptical of supernatural events depicted in any work of faith, yet I find the Bible to have helpful insights regarding meaningful life choices. I am interested in what scholars believe about who wrote the Gospels, simply because I like to learn about stuff in general. My respect for Christian teachings isn't going diminish no matter what scholars conclude regarding Bible authorship, and the profound wisdom I get from the Bible is not dependent on whether Jesus actually saved on catering bills for a big party by working with a few loaves of bread and some fish.

And I want to live where you do; in my neck of the universe, it's tough to find good moral teaching.

EDIT: Expanded on a point of difference I have with Reeko regarding faith

TomChick

04-11-2006, 10:16 PM

Who, then, is the beloved disciple and why in the world would tradition attribute it to John?

That's the million dollar question, isn't it? And I don't know if you noticed, but it's solely tradition that attributes it to John, not the actual text. You won't find the beloved disciple being identified with John, son of Zebedee, anywhere in the text. And in fact, there's a conspicuous omission of the episodes featuring the sons of Zebedee from the Gospel of John. Strange, particularly if you're arguing for that sort of first-hand authorship.

Where you will find the identification is in the canonization of the New Testament. There's evidence the Gospel according to John was nearly lost to Gnostic Christians, which is hardly surprising considering its distinctive tone. There's also evidence of tension between followers of John and Peter in early Christianity. Having a Johannine Gospel may very well have been a way to bring them back into the fold.

-Tom

TomChick

04-11-2006, 10:21 PM

What do you mean by faith?

Not the same thing as you. But that doesn't mean you get to hog the word all to yourself. :)

Seriously, I know that was glib, but it's a tough question that I don't have an easy answer for, particularly in a stilted format like a message board. This is much better suited to arguing about something relatively pedantic like who wrote the Gospels and whether Oblivion sucks.

-Tom

Reeko

04-11-2006, 10:27 PM

Hebrews 11:1 Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. 2 This is what the ancients were commended for. (NIV)

He is *not* referring to miracles here, BTW. He's referring to trust in the promises of God.

Edited to clarify what I mean by faith.

Phil_Stein

04-11-2006, 10:34 PM

[Edit - my post is primarily a response to Tom's post 85, but I was a bit slow in composing it - started with something lengthy, but, bahhh....]

Tom, I don't quite see how you pidgeon-hole my part of this discussion as primarily faith-based, and for that matter, I don't see the need for me to make an elaborate confession of my spiritual views in an argument framed on the historical record (and all the other means used to analyze this subject).

In any case, as a result of this discussion, I've done quite a bit more reading on the subject than I had previously. Not that it matters, of course - I just toss out all that intellectual hooey-gooey and go on faith alone :)

Now I'll turn it over to Reeko. Next up - how many angels can dance on the head of a pin?

Toddy

04-11-2006, 10:55 PM

Does authorship even really matter? There is clearly an oral tradition here that predates putting any of the Gospels down on papyrus, parchment, whatever, so this whole debate seems awfully goofy. Some of that tradition quite probably goes back to the guys who got their names up in, um, lights, but that's all you can say with regard to authors. To me, these are communal documents, with no single creators, but a lot of contributors.

Reeko

04-12-2006, 04:47 AM

And in fact, there's a conspicuous omission of the episodes featuring the sons of Zebedee from the Gospel of John. Strange, particularly if you're arguing for that sort of first-hand authorship.
The beloved disciple has to be *one* of the twelve. John and his brother James are the only ones not named anywhere in the gospel account. Ergo, it must be John or James. Tradition holds John.

Where you will find the identification is in the canonization of the New Testament. There's evidence the Gospel according to John was nearly lost to Gnostic Christians, which is hardly surprising considering its distinctive tone. There's also evidence of tension between followers of John and Peter in early Christianity. Having a Johannine Gospel may very well have been a way to bring them back into the fold.

YOU'VE JUST PROVED MY POINT!!!! :)
When you approach these things with a hermeneutic of suspiscion (we can't accept tradition), you have to have a hermeneutic of credulity about these theories (keeping John's "school" back into the fold). But there's crazy holes in this. First and foremost, is that at the time that the gospels were being written, church structure was way less centralized than that. There's other problems, but they take too long and I haven't had my coffee yet.

Does authorship even really matter?
To an unbeliever, no. If you're mining the text for something besides the author's intended message, you don't particularly care who wrote it. But the text itself claims its message:
John 20:31 but these [things] are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.
If you take the Gospel to have layers of addition and subtraction by many different authors and editors, you approach it assuming that these different people all had theological axes to grind. To get at what is truly there, you have to try to strip away those later additions and recover subtractions. The problem with that is there is not enough evidence inside any of the texts to do that. In fact, the only guidance you have is your *own* particular theological axe that you want to grind.

Further, the copies that we have today, recovered from very spread-out geography, some of which go back clear to the early 4th century, are all pretty uniform in what they claim the text to be. If people were adding and subtracting from these texts, the later copies would have to have a good bit of variation. There are some variances in small things, but these are usually attributable to scribal error.

Nick Walter

04-12-2006, 06:00 AM

To an unbeliever, no. If you're mining the text for something besides the author's intended message, you don't particularly care who wrote it. But the text itself claims its message:

Why should it matter to a believer either? I would think a believer would be even more blase about the topic of which human held the pen, since divine guidance and inspiration made sure that the message contained what god wanted it to.

Reeko

04-12-2006, 07:42 AM

Why should it matter to a believer either? I would think a believer would be even more blase about the topic of which human held the pen, since divine guidance and inspiration made sure that the message contained what god wanted it to.

Would it matter to me if we came to believe that Papias, disciple of John actually wrote this gospel? No, not really. To be honest, I don't really know where I stand on the issue of "the evangelist." I don't know if I'll ever be sure. But, I think that we should not dismiss the tradition out of hand just because it is the tradition.

I also want people to understand that taking something "on faith" doesn't necessarily mean closing your eyes, plugging your ears, and screaming LA LA LA LA! Do I have faith? Yes. Orthodox faith? As close as I can get to it. Is it a *blind* faith? Not at all.

Ryan Markel

04-12-2006, 09:53 AM

I know the question was asked earlier, but I suppose I should mention what was in my divinity program:

Two years' minimum each in Greek and Hebrew, plus either Latin or German. I got these prior to enrollment (B.A. Theological Languages, Concordia University - River Forest).

Hermeneutics classes (using Jim Voelz' What Does This Mean? as a fundamental textbook), worship classes, exegetical classes (three on each Testament) requiring all work to be with the Greek and Hebrew, a good deal of systematic theology classes, some church history, and a few assorted electives peppered here and there. Oh, and some homiletics and rhetoric.

Most of my electives revolved around either systematic theology or exegesis of the New Testament. One of the most interesting classes I ever had was evaluating secular ethical systems through theology. Fascinating.

TomChick

04-12-2006, 11:23 AM

When you approach these things with a hermeneutic of suspiscion (we can't accept tradition)

Why does it have to be a hermeneutics of "suspicion"? Why can't it be "curiousity" or "inquiry" or "elaboration"? Why do you feel the need to give it a negative bent? Those questions are partly rhetorical, because I already know the answer. :) But your choice of word is an unfair characterization. That would be like me insisting on putting the word "blind" before "faith" every time you used it.

As for the beloved disciple being John, you're still using tradition instead of text to make assumptions. I have no problems with tradition saying it's John and it certainly makes for a better read. But I do have a problem with ignoring evidence that it may not be that simple.

Ryan, your program would have killed me. Languages were always tough for me and I never even made it to Greek. I'm convinced I nearly blew a fuse with Hebrew. But being able to read parts of the Hebrew Bible in its original language was an experience I wouldn't trade for anything and it made it all worth while. Unfortunately, all that stuff has fled my brain now to make room for stuff like optimal build orders in Battle for Middle Earth II (two farms and then a barracks) and the name of that actor who played the mayor in Slither (Gregg Henry).

-Tom

Reeko

04-12-2006, 12:22 PM

Ryan, you and I have something in common (www.csl.edu).

By the way, vicarage is totally awesome.

If you can, take theological ethics and/or civic affairs with Biermann in the summer quarter. You'll be glad you did.

ScurvyPig

04-12-2006, 12:45 PM

I am going to wade in here...even with the entity present. Mr. Phil_Stein, there is 2,000 years of Catholic theology. Deeply concerned with questions you have asked. They have sat in their cells for a couple of thousand years, translating everything every early Christian has ever said. There are hundreds of documents to read, written by saints and sinners. There is a true tradition, not easy to read, but compiled by the greatest minds of the ancient and modern world. Why listen to a Harvard (or was he a Dartmouth) divinity student. It's well known they go to school to study a lie. Divinity school at Harvard or Dartmouth is complety devoted to the non-existence of God.

TomChick

04-12-2006, 01:02 PM

It's well known they go to school to study a lie. Divinity school at Harvard or Dartmouth is complety devoted to the non-existence of God.

That's pretty low, ScurvyPig, not to mention absolutely untrue. Harvard has plenty of students and teachers who consider themselves religious, even on your terms. My favorite professor was a devout orthodox Jew. I lived in the dorms with a Catholic priest. There are students there training for careers in the ministry.

-Tom

Reeko

04-12-2006, 01:32 PM

I'm gonna side with Tom on this one, Scurvy. A well-known Old Testament Exegetical Professor (www.ctsfw.edu/academics/faculty/maier3.php) at our sister seminary (considered to be the more conservative of the two) shares an alma mater with our friend Tom.

Wait a minute... Have we just been trolled?

shift6

04-12-2006, 08:05 PM

Edited to clarify to whom I was responding
And still got it wrong. It was TheSelfishGene, not me. :) No harm done though, just FYI.

Enidigm

04-12-2006, 08:49 PM

I don't think that's what I'm saying. You *can* analyze the Bible, if you want to. Analyze it all day. ...
What I *don't* get is why anyone outside of the orbit of faith would bother with it. If the main thought running through someone's head when they read it is, "this is all colossal bullshit," what makes them so interested in figuring out who did or did not write this book? Without the supernatural events recorded, the whole book is pointless. You can get good moral teaching anywhere.

So you're saying you can't judge the veracity of the supernatural events by the consitency of the temporal, mundane texts within which such occurances are recorded? In that case every hypothetical supernatural event, from crop circles to the familiar paranormal, have to be treated with equal credulity.

Which leads me to...

This is why, when it comes to the Gospel of Judas, I dismiss it out of hand. The Gospel of Judas, if it is true to its gnostic reputation, will claim that Jesus was rather a demigod whose human flesh was a prison. It will claim that Jesus only came to pass on secret knowledge so that people could escape the material prison that we live in because the evil god of the Old Testament created it.

Sorry. That just doesn't match what the apostles taught regarding Jesus. ... How do I know this? This is what has always been taught in the churches, from the very beginning. This teaching is the basis by which the original books of the Bible were accepted into canon.

It's not that I believe things are true because they are in the Bible. That's fundamentalism. I believe that things are in the Bible because they are true.

So the earth is flat because my father believed it to be so? And his father before him? And his father, and his father, until the beginings of time? Someone better call NASA and tell them to stop wasting money.

I'm not arguing the truthfulness of the Bible; but your logic, which though clearly wrapped in some heavy and weighty parchment leans more than you suspect upon your faith and less so upon your reason.

And it's not perhaps that tradition doesn't hold more weight - quite the contratry, it should be the default position - but arguing against the inclusion of secondary texts simply because they fall outside of tradition is, i'm afraid, not a convincing argument. Certainly heretical / anormal beliefs need to be explained away in a better way then saying they're heretical!

And to do this, you'll have to rely upon primogenture using the very dating methods you're dismissing as irrelevent.

I say this because you've placed great importance upon primacy conveying authority in this argument. But even then, this is not the sum of such speculation, but it is an important part. As i'm sure you're aware, you could debate (far better then myself) the influences upon the earliest Church by Paul and the subsequent direction Christianity took (and i'm sure if you debated me i'd lose, since this is not something i'm well read upon). Or upon the rise of mithraic ressurection cults throughout the near east under the rule of Rome - if not, as many assert, directly copied in Christianity (which i think is unlikely); one could argue, creating an environment in which ressurection played a key part in the thinking of the time.

Asking such difficult questions about the body of text in the NT is not just restricted to annihilating speculation but on the very fundemental question of the religious minded today: which religion is the right one? What criteria can be made to test them? Are you sure Christianity is right and Islam is wrong? And if you're sure, how did you decide? Unlike in ages past we don't have the luxury of ignorance, and if it's true that unbelievers are doomed to "the fire" if we (/ahem) choose... poorly i think this speculation and dating is a necessary part of any modern religion. And if secondary texts turn up, it seems too easy to just toss them back into the ashes of history without some consideration.

Ultimately i don't believe you can divorce faith from reason. I could go on for quite some time on this subject, since i feel it much more invigorating then arguing over actual Biblical accounts or contradictions or whatever. But i should say here that i do strongly disagree that all the such speculation is premised on the idea "this is all colossal bullshit". Non-religious inquiry is the best avenue for clarification and discussion; and if believers can't describe what and how they believe clearly enough to convince the open-minded, then how can they be so sure themselves?

Reeko

04-13-2006, 04:12 AM

Selfish,

Thanks for posting that. You're bringing up a huge bunch of issues that I would love to talk about. But it's Holy Week and I've got a ton of things to do. If I remember, I'll *resurrect* this thread later.

Ryan Markel

04-13-2006, 05:30 AM

Ryan, you and I have something in common (http://www.csl.edu).

By the way, vicarage is totally awesome.

If you can, take theological ethics and/or civic affairs with Biermann in the summer quarter. You'll be glad you did.

Well...

When you've left that place, come back and have a talk with me about my fourth year. Then we'll have a talk about how I'm not in the field.

Among other things.

Mordrak

07-14-2008, 07:24 PM

With regard to the Gospels, something happened a few thousand years ago that should have meant the end of what Jesus was trying to accomplish. But for whatever reason, it didn't. A misunderstood rabbi and a small handful of his followers were martyred and persecuted, but they still changed the world for the better. If that's not the Good News, that God somehow transcended death and defeat, that He actually reached into history, than I don't know what is.

I just finished reading the thread and this stuck out to me. It's an odd rationalization for faith.

salwon

07-14-2008, 07:43 PM

This was a very interesting read. As someone without much faith, even (or especially) in lack-of-faith, I greatly enjoy hearing people who know what they're talking about discuss religious history.

Anyone go to The Straight Dope (http://www.straightdope.com)? They had a 5-part "who wrote the bible?" that touches on some issues raised here.

Anti-Bunny

07-14-2008, 08:17 PM

Holy shit

RSofaer

07-15-2008, 12:44 PM

So, I saw this thread on the front page, clicked on it, and started reading. Lo and behold, RSofaer has already posted! I was taken aback! I had no recollection of this thread, the article, or my post. Have I been |-|4X0RR3|)? Then I see the date. Mordrak, I salute you for a terrific piece of necromancy.

Mordrak

07-15-2008, 02:24 PM

Neopythia

07-16-2008, 09:23 AM

I just finished reading the thread and this stuck out to me. It's an odd rationalization for faith.

I'm not sure one has to rationalize faith. That pretty much defeats the purpose.

It is a fascinating thread. Too bad most of the good discussion seems to have happened two years ago. This forum needs more divinity discussions!!

wildpokerman

07-17-2008, 01:41 PM

I just finished reading the thread and this stuck out to me. It's an odd rationalization for faith.

Not to mention that it's a dubious leap of alternative history to believe that the world is better off with Christianity than it would have been without it.

Kraaze

07-17-2008, 01:51 PM

Not to mention that it's a dubious leap of alternative history to believe that the world is better off with Christianity than it would have been without it.

I think that's a fairly defensible viewpoint, and I say that as an atheist.

extarbags

07-17-2008, 01:53 PM

I think that's a fairly defensible viewpoint, and I say that as an atheist.

Well realistically, it's not even close to provable one way or another. Lots of good and bad have come from Christianity, and we're talking about a two-thousand-year alternate history here... there's just no way to know how the world would have developed otherwise.

Dave Markell

07-17-2008, 02:02 PM

Well realistically, it's not even close to provable one way or another. Lots of good and bad have come from Christianity, and we're talking about a two-thousand-year alternate history here... there's just no way to know how the world would have developed otherwise.

Yeah, this is a question whose benefit lies more in the asking than the answering. Thinking about the positive and negative consequences of religion is productive; trying to absolutely quantify them into a plus or minus value is pretty much impossible.

Anti-Bunny

07-17-2008, 02:55 PM

Lots of good...have come from Christianity

Oh, really? Like what?

And don't say art, because that would be wrong. Jesus didn't paint the sistine chapel.

And don't say Mendelian inheritance, either.

Kraaze

07-17-2008, 03:03 PM

Just because I love to wind you up AB, I'll say: The sistine chapel and mendelian inheritance.

And I'm serious about both.

Anti-Bunny

07-17-2008, 03:05 PM

The sistine chapel and mendelian inheritance.

And I'm serious about both.

Explain yourself.

Podunk

07-17-2008, 03:11 PM

I might also throw the origins of Western music and functional harmony in there with the Sistine Chapel.

edit: also, those Trappist monks make some fabulous beer.

Anti-Bunny

07-17-2008, 03:21 PM

also, those Trappist monks make some fabulous beer.

I love St. Bernardus, but god didn't tell them how to brew it (it just tastes that way).

Rimbo

07-17-2008, 03:32 PM

I agree with extarbags and Dave Markell -- tough to say what might have happened. Clouding the issue is the fact that Christian institutions often diverge from Christian ideals, and that there are numerous contradictory sets of Christian ideals. Both the Scientific pursuit of knowledge and the reaction to it are (and have been, and will continue to be) Christian ideals. Both justice for criminals and forgiveness of crimes are Christian ideals. Both the persecution and salvation of unbelievers are Christian ideals. (Leaving them alone, however, hasn't ever been.)

Speaking as a Christian, I think it's clear that the Christian religion as a human institution has been a double-edged sword; I wouldn't know whether the good outweighs the bad or not. I don't see the need to defend the Christian religion just because I am a Christian, because I'm accountable for my own beliefs and actions, not those of e.g. some guy in Europe who wears a funny hat.

Mordrak

07-17-2008, 03:40 PM

Both the Scientific pursuit of knowledge and the reaction to it are (and have been, and will continue to be) Christian ideals....

Huh? The medieval view of Christianity is basically anti-science. Everything God wants us to know is in the Bible. There's no scientific imperative in Christianity.

(Leaving them alone, however, hasn't ever been.)

Huh? He without sin cast the first stone. How about that story about taking the spec out of your eye before trying to remove another's? Or the best one of all, give unto Caesar's what is Caesar's and unto God's what is God's? How about turning the other cheek?*

Christianity has a very strong bent toward just leaving other people alone, other than in acts of compassion and charity.

*Those are all parpaphrasing.

Linoleum

07-17-2008, 03:43 PM

Er what? The medieval view of Christianity is basically anti-science. Everything God wants us to know is in the bible. There's no scientific imperative in Christianity.

Aquinas and William of Ockham would like to have a word with you out back.

Mordrak

07-17-2008, 03:52 PM

Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Aquinas)
In 1270, the bishop of Paris issued an edict condemning a number of teachings then current at the university, which derived from Aristotle (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aristotle) or from Arabic philosophers such as Averroes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Averroes). The teachings of Thomas were among those targeted. This condemnation gave rise to an investigation in Paris, in response to which the Dominican order prudently moved Thomas to Italy. Eventually, in 1277 (three years after Thomas's death), the bishop of Paris issued another, more detailed edict in which he condemned a series of Thomas's theses as heretical, and excommunicated Thomas posthumously. The bishop of Oxford issued a similar condemnation a few months later. These condemnations echoed the orthodox Augustinian (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustinian) theology of the day, which considered human reason inadequate to understand the will of God.

Well, he didn't seem that well received.

Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_of_Ockham)
Fearing imprisonment and possible execution, Ockham, Cesena, and other Franciscan sympathizers fled Avignon on 26 May1328, and eventually took refuge in the court of the Holy Roman Emperor (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_Roman_Emperor) Louis IV of Bavaria (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_IV_of_Bavaria), who was also engaged in dispute with the papacy. Ockham was excommunicated (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excommunication) for leaving Avignon, but his philosophy was never officially condemned.

I guess Mr. Ockham wasn't either.

Eventually the church came around like it always does, but I'm not sure what theological (scripture) basis they had. From what I understand their justifications were based in philosophy, not Christianity. They just pointed out that philosophy wasn't inconsistent with Christianity. That's different than saying Christianity itself proactively encourages science.

Linoleum

07-17-2008, 04:00 PM

Mordrak

07-17-2008, 04:11 PM

You asked about the medieval view. You don't get to the Enlightenment without that which came from developments that happened in the Western Church. Yes, there was controversy, but that's where it came from and that's the heritage of Western Christianity.

The reason their views were controversial is because they were not the accepted views of the church. And the only reason it's a heritage of Western Christianity is because the church was one of the few ways to become educated (and I use that term loosely) in addition to the Church's monolithic presence. You're not going to find any formal philosophical or theological arguments come out of an illiterate peasantry.

So did these views come out of the theology of Christianity or the historical happenstance of its dominance?

Linoleum

07-17-2008, 04:29 PM

They changed the theology of Western Christianity.

Mordrak

07-17-2008, 04:33 PM

They changed the theology of Western Christianity.

Really? The last I heard Christians were trying to get evolution kicked out of school.

You had a couple of smart guys born during a religiously ubiquitous era stand up and advocate knowledge. It wasn't because they were Christians.

Rimbo

07-17-2008, 04:37 PM

Huh? He without sin cast the first stone. How about that story about taking the spec out of your eye before trying to remove another's? Or the best one of all, give unto Caesar's what is Caesar's and unto God's what is God's? How about turning the other cheek?*

Christianity has a very strong bent toward just leaving other people alone, other than in acts of compassion and charity.

Those are mostly assuming that the other person is already a believer. Although there is a line about "cast not your pearls before swine" (Matthew 7:6), which is basically a derogatory way of saying that you shouldn't push your beliefs on people who won't appreciate them, but if this has ever been an idea that's really been put into action by even a significant minority of Christians, then I'm completely ignorant of it.

Eventually the church came around like it always does, but I'm not sure what theological (scripture) basis they had.

It came around, yes; I think part of your confusion comes from the direction (especially in the U.S.) it's been going since the middle of the 20th century (from a movement that began in the late 19th century), a sort of post-enlightenment whiplash. It went in one direction for a while, and for the past fifty years it's been going the other way.

The Parable of the Talents and the dedication of the Earth and all in it to men from God are two scriptures that are used to justify the pursuit of knowledge. Also, one of the themes of the Bible, through the whole thing, is the failure of church leaders to lead people down the correct path. Granted, this is largely because of theological shifts as recorded in the Bible (e.g. the Deuteronomists and the Gospels), but in practice this means the Bible has a lot of support for the idea that we should question accepted church doctrines.

Linoleum

07-17-2008, 04:41 PM

Really? The last I heard Christians were trying to get evolution kicked out of school.

You had a couple of smart guys born during a religiously ubiquitous era stand up and advocate knowledge. It wasn't because they were Christians.

You are equating modern American evangelicalism with the majority of the world Christian population. Loud and obnoxious as they are, they are the minority. Hell, large chunks of their doctrine didn't even exist before the 19th century. Your ignorance is showing.

The Scholastic movement was not a matter of "a couple smart guys". Now, you can trace the fruits of scholasticism leading to the development of philosophical nominalism and secularism, and how it changed and affected Christianity in the Western world, but it was integral and had lasting effects.

Mordrak

07-17-2008, 04:45 PM

The Parable of the Talents and the dedication of the Earth and all in it to men from God are two scriptures that are used to justify the pursuit of knowledge theologically. Also, one of the themes of the Bible, through the whole thing, is the failure of church leaders to lead people down the correct path. Granted, this is largely because of theological shifts as recorded in the Bible (e.g. the Deuteronomists and the Gospels), but in practice this means the Bible has a lot of support for the idea that we should question accepted church doctrines.

Questioning church doctrines is now science? I guess that depends on which doctrine you're talking about. At best, Christianity is indifferent to science.

It's more accurate to credit things to individuals and history rather than something like, Christianity. That way you don't have to get into the messy business of trying to separate people, doctrine, and scripture.

Rimbo

07-17-2008, 04:51 PM

Questioning church doctrines is now science?

Close; I would say that Science questioned church doctrines, and that scripture supports this sort of thing. This is, after all, the root source of Fundamentalism: Archaeology, Biology, Paleontology and the like were demonstrating that certain doctrines were impossible, and many people who held those doctrines inviolate reacted by rejecting Science.

At best, Christianity is indifferent to science.

Well, it depends on one's interpretation of scripture, doesn't it? This is your interpretation of scripture, but not mine. :)

Linoleum

07-17-2008, 05:01 PM

It's more accurate to credit things to individuals and history rather than something like, Christianity. That way you don't have to get into the messy business of trying to separate people, doctrine, and scripture.

It's hard to do that when the drive of the underlying systems happened in the matter of theological development. The results of which drove shifts in a great number of things, the least of which being the modernist concept of individual self identity (http://www.amazon.com/Sources-Self-Making-Modern-Identity/dp/0674824261).

Mordrak

07-17-2008, 05:06 PM

You are equating modern American evangelicalism with the majority of the world Christian population. Loud and obnoxious as they are, they are the minority. Hell, large chunks of their doctrine didn't even exist before the 19th century. Your ignorance is showing.

It was an off the cuff joke, not a serious accusation against the Christianity as a whole. However, you do have other issues, like abortion, birth control, etc, which do infringe on science and many Christian institutions (the Catholic Church for example) seem to take a purposefully ignorant view for the sake of theology.

The Scholastic movement was not a matter of "a couple smart guys". Now, you can trace the fruits of scholasticism leading to the development of philosophical nominalism and secularism, and how it changed and affected Christianity in the Western world, but it was integral and had lasting effects.

My point is, if we're talking about what we can credit to Christianity and it would seem very little. Rather, we can credit much more to the circumstances of history. Basically, the premise of Tom's comment is: isn't it great (Good News!) that Christianity has survived 2000 years and impacted the world over? Surely, that's been a good thing.

To that I reply, "Meh."

Well, it depends on one's interpretation of scripture, doesn't it? This is your interpretation of scripture, but not mine. :)

Science is a very specific discipline.

Linoleum

07-17-2008, 05:09 PM

It was an off the cuff joke, not a serious accusation against the Christianity as a whole. However, you do have other issues, like abortion, birth control, etc, which do infringe on science and many Christian institutions (the Catholic Church for example) seem to take a purposefully ignorant view for the sake of theology.

Abortion and birth control? Those are fundamentally moral stances.

My point is, if we're talking about what we can credit to Christianity and it would seem very little. Rather, we can credit much more to the circumstances of history.

You need to learn more about history and Christianity and the mixture of the two, to say the least.

It's only a matter of theological development in the sense that they had to push theology out of the way.

Um, no, it was development, not "pushing out of the way". At this point I'm not quite sure you actually understand what theology is, either from a Western or Eastern definition...

Mordrak

07-17-2008, 05:11 PM

It's hard to do that when the drive of the underlying systems happened in the matter of theological development. The results of which drove shifts in a great number of things, the least of which being the modernist concept of individual self identity.

You need to learn more about history and Christianity and the mixture of the two, to say the least.

It's only a matter of theological development in the sense that they had to push theology out of the way. And the only framework they had for doing so was within a Christian society, so of course it's going to be framed in that terminology and world view.

Edit: Heh, we're both replying too fast.

Um, no, it was development, not "pushing out of the way".

Of course they are going to make theological arguments (arguments with regard to understanding of religious texts and doctrine), because they basically had to.

At this point I'm not quite sure you actually understand what theology is, either from a Western or Eastern definition...

And this is just a stupid cop-out on your part.

Linoleum

07-17-2008, 05:25 PM

Rimbo

07-17-2008, 05:30 PM

Science is a very specific discipline.

Could you... y'know... expand on that?

Rimbo

07-17-2008, 05:42 PM

I get the feeling that what's happening here isn't so much disagreement as that we're kind of talking at right angles to each other. To me, Science is a set of specific disciplines that all subscribe to a specific methodology for acquiring knowledge. This methodology itself, however, didn't burst fully-formed from the head of Zeus. Also, the collective fields that apply the Method, the knowledge so acquired, and just this whole attitude of open-minded curiosity and thirst for information one could also consider parts of Science.

To me, Christianity and Science are both about the pursuit of what's true, and not ready-packaged belief systems.

Mordrak

07-17-2008, 05:48 PM

The underpinnings were seen as fundamental to an improved understanding of God. These formal/logical/rational constructs influenced the very basis of thought. You seem to think there were a bunch of crypto-Dawkins doing an end-run around theology to come up with reason. That's not the reality.

That's not what I mean to be saying, but I'm not sure how else to phrase it. Arg. Language is not my strong point. :(

Edit: There's a part in Socrates' (or Plato's) Apology, where Socrates' define his philosophical goals in terms of the religious and mystical terms of his day. I'm not going to say what Socrates' really believed, but rather that we are product of our times and influences. Similarly, I don't doubt that they sought a greater understanding of God. I heard something similar about Newton who considered math the language of God. But that doesn't mean Calculus is a product of Christianity.

Could you... y'know... expand on that?

If you want to claim that Christianity actively supports science, I don't think scripture would have to be interpreted.

Linoleum

07-17-2008, 05:50 PM

And this is just a stupid cop-out on your part.

It's more like trying to have a car engine discussion with someone that couldn't articulate the difference between a overhead camshaft versus traditional pushrod engine.

Let me make a prognosis, if I tell you the birth of Modernest thought was essential for the development of systematic theology, you're probably going to have to go look up the definition of systematic theology on freaking wikipedia. And that's elementary.

Mordrak

07-17-2008, 05:57 PM

It's more like trying to have a car engine discussion with someone that couldn't articulate the difference between a overhead camshaft versus traditional pushrod engine.

Let me make a prognosis, if I tell you the birth of Modernest thought was essential for the development of systematic theology, you're probably going to have to go look up the definition of systematic theology on freaking wikipedia. And that's elementary.

Whatever, this is over.

Unicorn McGriddle

07-17-2008, 06:20 PM

He without sin cast the first stone. How about that story about taking the spec out of your eye before trying to remove another's? Or the best one of all, give unto Caesar's what is Caesar's and unto God's what is God's? How about turning the other cheek?

Those are mostly assuming that the other person is already a believer.

What the fuck, no. Christian scripture definitely enjoins compassion, even love, toward those who do not believe.

"Let he who is without sin cast the first stone." John 8:1-11. It's possible that a Christian, even in the early, white-hot days before Rome or St. Paul or even the Crucifixion, would have committed adultery. It's possible, too, that Jesus would tell her to "go and sin no more" without reference to her declared faith. But it sounds more to me like an exhortation to convert, so I see the implication that the adulteress is not a Christian. (The NIV seems even more in line with this interpretation, with Jesus telling the woman to "leave your life of sin.")

"There is a mote in your eye." Luke 6:37-42, also Matthew 7:1-5. Both Matthew and Luke use the term "brother" for the guy with the mote in his eye, the one you're not supposed to judge. That could be specifically a fellow Christian. But Matthew follows this passage with "pearls before swine" (Matthew 7:6-12), which, though rude, designates unbelievers and declares that only those who ask shall receive. In other words, judgement should be offered as counsel to those who seek it, not persecution against disinterested non-followers. Luke ups the ante, leading into "judge not, lest ye be judged" with (quite possibly cribbing from Plato) "love your enemies" (Luke 6:27-36). If the assumption is present that "your enemies" will be other Christians, it's entirely implicit.

"Render unto Caesar." Luke 20:21-26, Matthew 22:16-22, Mark 12:12-17. This is an interesting story. Christ's religious enemies want to trap him into advocating a breach of secular law, so they ask him whether he endorses paying taxes. He says something dramatic that could be taken either way (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Render_unto_Caesar...). I don't think this one belongs in the list; it doesn't seem to have much bearing on whether heathens should be persecuted.

"Turn the other cheek." Luke 6:29, also Matthew 5:38-89. Matthew contrasts this with the Old Testament's endorsement of talion. That endorsement itself is a complicated thing, but I suppose it could be seen as an issue of religious law not intended to apply to outsiders. If, by analogy, Matthew's "turn the other cheek" has the same scope, it could be the rare exception that is as Rimbo says it is. But in both gospels that mention this phrase, its context seems broader. Luke leads into it with "Bless them that curse you" (Luke 6:28) (were a lot of Christians cursing each other in those days, or did the community at large tend to curse them? Who was stealing all the coats anyway, and why were lawsuits involved?), and Matthew follows it up with Matthew 5:41, discussed below.

Let me add a couple of my own.

"The good Samaritan." Luke 10:25-37. Samaritans were a religious minority, distinct from Jews or Christians (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samaritan). The point of the parable is precisely that it is the Samaritan, the racial and religious enemy and certainly not a fellow Christian, who is the "neighbor" (because of his display of compassion). The opposing viewpoint (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_samaritan#Minority_view) is that what Jesus really meant is that there is no salvation through works because it's completely impossible to accept people who don't share your ethnicity and faith. I have to admit that A) many modern Christians, such as Jack Chick, emphatically reject salvation through works, and B) Christians have historically had difficulty with tolerance, starting when Christianity began to address tolerance questions from the side of authority. Tolerance is a lot more appealing to those who need it.

"And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain." Matthew 5:41. Who could "compel [Christ's followers] to go a mile"? Roman soldiers (http://puzzlingbofm.blogspot.com/2007/11/puzzle-433.html), that's who. The Roman Empire wouldn't adopt Christianity until 380 AD, or even legalize it until 313 AD (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_ancient_Rome), so Christ, speaking before the end of his thirty-odd-year lifetime starting around 1 AD, is unlikely to have considered Roman soldiers fellow Christians.

Wouldn't it be crazy if somebody started a religion based on the gospels?

Unicorn McGriddle

07-17-2008, 06:23 PM

To me, Christianity and Science are both about the pursuit of what's true, and not ready-packaged belief systems.

I'd like to address this, but I'm having a hard time finding the relevant scriptures in the Book of Science.

Rimbo

07-17-2008, 06:24 PM

What the fuck, no. Christian scripture definitely enjoins compassion, even love, toward those who do not believe.

Yeah, sure. I wholeheartedly agree with everything you wrote.

It's just that we were talking about proselytizing.

Unicorn McGriddle

07-17-2008, 06:46 PM

Yeah, sure. I wholeheartedly agree with everything you wrote.

It's just that we were talking about proselytizing.

But it sounds more to me like an exhortation to convert, so I see the implication that the adulteress is not a Christian. (The NIV seems even more in line with this interpretation, with Jesus telling the woman to "leave your life of sin.")

Even after saving her life, Jesus was content to leave the adulteress with a curt, ambiguous variant of holier-than-thou. Maybe he just meant "don't cheat on your husband any more." He didn't harass her or withhold aid contingent on her conversion. Her house isn't burned, her windows aren't smashed (or whatever the First Century equivalent was). She isn't killed, exiled, or imprisoned; she isn't given special nonbeliever duties or barred from certain authorities and honors.

"There is a mote in your eye." Matthew follows this passage with "pearls before swine" (Matthew 7:6-12), which, though rude, designates unbelievers and declares that only those who ask shall receive. In other words, judgement should be offered as counsel to those who seek it, not persecution against disinterested non-followers.

The point of the parable is precisely that it is the Samaritan, the racial and religious enemy and certainly not a fellow Christian, who is the "neighbor" (because of his display of compassion).

Contrast with the often-observed disparity between the American Christian perception of the value of an American Christian life and the American Christian perception of the value of a foreign, heathen life.

"And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain." Matthew 5:41.

Astonishingly, Matthew 5:42 is not "Spend the second mile telling the soldier about how he'll be tortured for eternity because he wasn't more like you. PS YOU'RE AWESOME"

You don't agree with me, certainly not wholeheartedly. If you do, your whole heart is rotten.

Anti-Bunny

07-17-2008, 06:51 PM

sesquipidalian loquaciousness ftw
You don't get to the Enlightenment without that which came from developments that happened in the Western Church. Yes, there was controversy, but that's where it came from and that's the heritage of Western Christianity.
Complete bullshit. The foundations of the enlightenment have a lot more to do with Socrates and Plato then Thomas Aquinas. William of Ockham cribbed Aristotle. See also, similar pre- and nonchristian scholars, jewish scholars like Maimonides, and arabs like Averroes, and on and on. But that's what happens in philosophy (and science). You develop your ideas based on what came before.

Church gets partial credit for preserving scholastic traditions.. partial because they also trashed a lot of it. But again, that they did so had nothing to do with christian values. Scholasticism was just taking Aristotle and Socrates and trying to make their system work in a christian way. Yes, they preserved their knowledge and literacy (albeit VERY selectively), but they didn't do it because they were religious. Nor did their religion in any way ENHANCE that preservation. This is the same basic problem as the art argument. William of Ockham would have been just as successful as a contributor to the human knowledge as a secular academic as he did as a monk. His being religious was not a necessary precondition for his contribution (except insofar as at the time, only religious people got access to a lot of his books). But again, nowhere is it established that you have to be a religious institution to preserve knowledge.

So again, show me something Christianity did, that couldn't have been done as well OR BETTER by a non-religious system. And again, these 'religious contributions', espeicially the bullshit about enlightenment, is ridiculous because they're based heavily on recreating the work that already existed, created by the Greeks and the Romans, and to a lesser extent both religious and secular Arab scholars. (Don't forget that the Caliphate was actually very advanced for its time in may ways, before stagnation)

TomChick

07-17-2008, 07:08 PM

So again, show me something Christianity did, that couldn't have been done as well OR BETTER by a non-religious system.

Uh, how about "religion"?

I suspect it would be pretty impossible to have a conversation with you about this, though. You seem to be, uh, one of those people, every bit as intractable is a Mormon or Jehovah's Witness, but a lot less polite.

-Tom

Anti-Bunny

07-17-2008, 07:12 PM

So religion is good..

because, it brought this world religion..

That's deep.

TomChick

07-17-2008, 07:18 PM

Linoleum

07-17-2008, 07:41 PM

Complete bullshit. The foundations of the enlightenment have a lot more to do with Socrates and Plato then Thomas Aquinas. William of Ockham cribbed Aristotle. See also, similar pre- and nonchristian scholars, jewish scholars like Maimonides, and arabs like Averroes, and on and on. But that's what happens in philosophy (and science). You develop your ideas based on what came before.

Nobody is denying the influence of the Greeks, it wasn't in the scope of the discussion. I'm amused that in your mention progression, but to your mind in A-B-C, B being what it was was pretty much arbitrary and anything could have resulted in C.

So again, show me something Christianity did, that couldn't have been done as well OR BETTER by a non-religious system. And again, these 'religious contributions', espeicially the bullshit about enlightenment, is ridiculous because they're based heavily on recreating the work that already existed, created by the Greeks and the Romans, and to a lesser extent both religious and secular Arab scholars. (Don't forget that the Caliphate was actually very advanced for its time in may ways, before stagnation)

The value and identity of the human person. Ironically, this is something that was greatly diminished in the adoption of rationalism by Western theology (at least from an Eastern perspective). Of course from a certain Eastern Orthodox perspective, Christianity isn't a religion, but a therapeutic treatment.

Lh'owon

07-17-2008, 07:53 PM

Okay, how about you explain to me the difference Aristotle has made in the average person's spiritual life? Then multiply that by the number of people who've been on this planet since Aristotle.

If you want to talk about the benefit of Christianity without treating it as a religion, you're missing the point.

-Tom

I find this a little hard to swallow. How can you talk about the "average person's spiritual life" when there are many people who, throughout history, have not considered themselves to have such a thing? And to pit one philosopher, no matter how prominent, against an entire religion is a bit disingenuous.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but you seem to be assuming that everyone possesses a "spiritual life" and therefore religion has fulfilled that need. Which is dangerously close to circular reasoning, unless you can prove that (some or many) people have a need for religion without religion itself fostering that need.

I do however agree that not treating Christianity as a religion is missing the point. Also, I'm not agreeing with Anti-Bunny, just replying to this post.

Rimbo

07-17-2008, 07:56 PM

Re: Unicorn McGriddle

So which of your points is the one that I'm supposed to disagree with?

MikeSofaer

07-17-2008, 07:58 PM

I don't think it's fair to say that Ockham could have been productive without the church and not allow that Torquemada could have been a torturer without the church.

Lh'owon

07-17-2008, 08:07 PM

I don't think it's fair to say that Ockham could have been productive without the church and not allow that Torquemada could have been a torturer without the church.

It is, however, quite reasonable to say that Torquemada would, almost certainly, have not been so, er, productive, without the twin shelters of divine right and the evidence-defying word "heretic".

Anti-Bunny

07-17-2008, 08:08 PM

Okay, how about you explain to me the difference Aristotle has made in the average person's spiritual life? Then multiply that by the number of people who've been on this planet since Aristotle.

If you want to talk about the benefit of Christianity without treating it as a religion, you're missing the point.

-Tom

First, I reject your smuggled premise that there IS such a thing as "spiritual life". When people describe the benefits of their various metaphysical belief systems, what they really end up describing is a purely emotional/psychological phenomenon: how good/peaceful/content it makes them FEEL about themselves, the world, and their place in it. And that doesn't require religion or even idiosyncratic and unorganized supernatural beliefs like the various new age philosophies. And, since Aristotle's Organon laid the groundwork for modern formal logic and rationalism, and since his arguments for human minds as a tabula rasa played an almost as critical role in the foundation of empiricism... He deserves a share of credit for all that modern rational inquiry has done for the human condition. Which is to say, a FUCK of a lot more than making people less frightened of death or making them feel better about their lot in life because their lot has the imprimatur of supernatural Authority.

Rimbo

07-17-2008, 08:17 PM

What about religions that don't necessarily depend on a supernatural authority, such as some of the Eastern religions or even (to some extent) Scientology?

Tankero

07-17-2008, 08:21 PM

What about religions that don't necessarily depend on a supernatural authority, such as some of the Eastern religions or even (to some extent) Scientology?
Loaded fucking question.

Unicorn McGriddle

07-17-2008, 08:22 PM

So which of your points is the one that I'm supposed to disagree with?

Christianity has a very strong bent [according to the New Testament] toward just leaving other people alone, other than in acts of compassion and charity.

Aggressively spreading the faith, I might add, is NOT an act of compassion, it's an act of hegemony.

TomChick

07-17-2008, 08:32 PM

How can you talk about the "average person's spiritual life" when there are many people who, throughout history, have not considered themselves to have such a thing?

And what does this have to do with the price of tea in China*? I'm talking about the perception of a spiritual life, the subjective experience of a person, regardless of the ontological existence of a soul or whatever. If, through religion, a person believes his place in the universe is special and he is loved by God, what does it matter that a minority of all the people in existence have missed out on this belief?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but you seem to be assuming that everyone possesses a "spiritual life" and therefore religion has fulfilled that need.

Religion has given people a spiritual life. Historically, religion and spiritual life have gone hand in hand (today, "spiritual" often has a weirdly personal "believe what I want to believe and everything's cool" connotation that serves a very different purpose). Religion answers questions that not-religion cannot, by its very definition, answer.

-Tom

* I really have no idea what that idiom means, but lordy, do I love to use it.

TomChick

07-17-2008, 08:34 PM

First, I reject your smuggled premise that there IS such a thing as "spiritual life".

First, I couldn't care less what you reject. This isn't about you.

Second, there wasn't even a "second" in your post, so how can you have a "first"?

-Tom

P.S. "Who taught you math?"

Anti-Bunny

07-17-2008, 08:36 PM

Nobody is denying the influence of the Greeks, it wasn't in the scope of the discussion. I'm amused that in your mention progression, but to your mind in A-B-C, B being what it was was pretty much arbitrary and anything could have resulted in C.
I'm not saying that at all. I'm saying that in the progression of western thought from A->B->C, there is nothing uniquely "Christian" about the stuff provided by the thinkers at stage B.

Those thoughts could have come just as easily from a non-christian thinker. It's not as if Greek philosophers + Bible = enlightenment. In fact, most of the reasoning done by these "religious" minds is religious only insofar as they first produce their rational structures, then twist them around to make christian doctrine fit them and/or vice-versa.

Christianity doesn't actually bring anything to the table in terms of rational or empirical thought. It has a lot to say about morality. But even then, it's not deriving that morality from rational argument, but from various a priori arguments and appeals to authority (god/this prophet/jesus/this disciple said so).

The value and identity of the human person.

Uh, no. Biology can be held accountable for that. Everyone born values their own life. If you need religion to give you identity or to make you value life, your life or anyones, you don't need religion.. you would need psychotherapy and quite possibly institutionalization.

Of course from a certain Eastern Orthodox perspective, Christianity isn't a religion, but a therapeutic treatment.

the same is true of eastern philosophies as well, but they both are not the best way of addressing the problem, because it's rather like "treating" someone with anxieties by rationalizing their avoidance behaviors, rather than actually working with them until they conquer their avoidant and anxious behavior and don't engage in them anymore.
When it comes to dealing with fear of death and existential anxiety and uncertainty, religion is the psychological and emotional equivalent of binge eating and comfort food. It feels good, but it has disastrous consequences in the long run and it doesn't address the root problem.

Rimbo

07-17-2008, 08:45 PM

Aggressively spreading the faith, I might add, is NOT an act of compassion, it's an act of hegemony.

Sure. Now, is that what Christian beliefs say about "aggressively spreading the faith?"

Ed Solomon

07-17-2008, 08:49 PM

This thread really needs a dinosaur.

Or a zombie.

Or maybe an adorable kid with a puppy.

An adorable kid with a puppy being chased by a zombie dinosaur is probably asking for too much, though.

Talisker

07-17-2008, 08:54 PM

Or a zombie.
http://newworldodour.co.uk/live/files/zombie_jesus.jpg

TomChick

07-17-2008, 08:55 PM

Various stuff written at Linoleum

Ugh. Just ugh.

If I had a nickel for every time I got jumped by someone like you in a conversation about religion. You're worse than the inerrant Bible thumpers. At least those guys have a weird sense of poetry to what they're arguing.

-Tom

Rimbo

07-17-2008, 08:55 PM

I'm not saying that at all. I'm saying that in the progression of western thought from A->B->C, there is nothing uniquely "Christian" about the stuff provided by the thinkers at stage B.

Those thoughts could have come just as easily from a non-christian thinker.

Sure, and by the same token, the liquid-fueled rocket could have been invented by someone other than Goddard, the world's greatest violins could have been built by someone other than Stradivarius, and Windows could have been built by a company other than Microsoft. If you're going to go to these lengths to refuse credit to Christianity for any of the things it's done, then you're going to go to the point where you can credit nothing. And by the same token, you can't blame anything, either. It could have been someone other than Lenin to lead the Soviet Revolution. It could have been some country other than England to defeat the Spanish Armada. Windows could have been written by someone other than Microsoft. And so on, and so forth.

You can't really point to any ideas as being uniquely Christian from this perspective, and so the whole concept of Christianity -- and the idea of blaming it -- becomes meaningless. At some point you have to identify either a set of beliefs or an institution and demonstrate how they and they alone persist and created something you found objectionable, but then when someone shows how that same set of beliefs or institution did something good, you can't say "No no no, you ARE NOT ALLOWED to muddle with my comic-book demonization!"

Anti-Bunny

07-17-2008, 08:56 PM

If, through religion, a person believes his place in the universe is special and he is loved by God, what does it matter that a minority of all the people in existence have missed out on this belief?
Why does it matter? Well, for starters because I happen to have the crazy notion that truth is better than falsehood, regardless of how ugly the truth or how pretty the falsehood, because truth is the foundation on which we build progress... Whether it's material scientific progress, such as improving our quality of life through technology. Intellectual progress, such as developing a more accurate understanding of our own natures and the nature of the world around us, allowing us to forge better lives both individually AND as a society. Or emotional progress, such as coming to grips with unpleasant truths (such as, say, the fundamental failure of a marriage or long-term friendship), allowing us to take the necessary steps to rectify the situation and to emerge as happier and healthier individuals.

When you say that "this makes me feel special, so why does it matter whether its true or not?" You're rejecting a process that is fundamental to ANY meaningful effort to enrich and improve our lives (and, by extension, the lives of our descendants).

Religion has given people a spiritual life. Historically, religion and spiritual life have gone hand in hand (today, "spiritual" often has a weirdly personal "believe what I want to believe and everything's cool" connotation that serves a very different purpose). Religion answers questions that not-religion cannot, by its very definition, answer.

I disagree there.
Morality? Check
"What happens after I die?" Check
"Why are we here?" Check
"Why does the universe exist?" Check
"What is the universe for?" Check
"What is my purpose in life?" Check

Anti-Bunny

07-17-2008, 08:59 PM

Ugh. Just ugh.

If I had a nickel for every time I got jumped by someone like you in a conversation about religion. You're worse than the inerrant Bible thumpers. At least those guys have a weird sense of poetry to what they're arguing.

-Tom

I like how you suggest I have 'jumped' you. As if to dispute the assumption that religion has inherent worth is somehow tantamount to unprovoked and unjustified assault, as opposed to honest intellectual inquiry.

TomChick

07-17-2008, 09:03 PM

Why does it matter? Well, for starters because I happen to have the crazy notion that truth is better than falsehood, regardless of how ugly the truth or how pretty the falsehood, because truth is the foundation on which we build progress...material scientific progress...Intellectual progress...a more accurate understanding...forge better lives...emotional progress

It's kind of funny how you sound curiously like a religious zealot, except you spell "truth" with a lower-case "t".

I like how you suggest I have 'jumped' you. As if to dispute the assumption that religion has inherent worth is somehow tantamount to unprovoked and unjustified assault, as opposed to honest intellectual inquiry.

Regardless, guys like you are great at clearing out the room!

-Tom

Anti-Bunny

07-17-2008, 09:06 PM

It's kind of funny how you sound curiously like a religious zealot, except you spell "truth" with a lower-case "t".

Regardless, guys like you are great at clearing out the room!

-Tom
And descent to ad hominem

Good night, everyone!

Rimbo

07-17-2008, 09:18 PM

Regardless, guys like you are great at clearing out the room!

-Tom

Naw, I think Unicorn McGriddle and I could go on for quite a while after everyone left.

Unicorn McGriddle

07-17-2008, 09:24 PM

Sure. Now, is that what Christian beliefs say about "aggressively spreading the faith?"

Are the Biblical passages Mordrak referenced "Christian beliefs"?

TomChick

07-17-2008, 09:28 PM

Naw, I think Unicorn McGriddle and I could go on for quite a while after everyone left.

Well, yeah, me too. By "cleared the room", I meant cleared it of everyone else who went out into the other room to have a fun party and leave us pretentious losers arguing to no effect.

Which is kind of what the P&R forum is. Carry on.

-Tom

shift6

07-17-2008, 09:31 PM

Huh? The medieval view of Christianity is basically anti-science. Everything God wants us to know is in the Bible. There's no scientific imperative in Christianity.
There is no imperative, true. But historically many devout Christians (whether Protestant, Catholic, or Orthodox) in many periods have pursued science with an eye to seeing what God did in more detail. Many big names leap to mind: Newton, Galileo, Kepler, etc. It is true that "The Church" may not have at certain times in the past, but that doesn't mean Christians haven't.

I'd recommend you do some reading on natural theology, natural philosophy, the Age of Enlightenment, and other topics having to do with the gradual development of modern science.

Huh? He without sin cast the first stone. How about that story about taking the spec out of your eye before trying to remove another's? Or the best one of all, give unto Caesar's what is Caesar's and unto God's what is God's? How about turning the other cheek?*

Christianity has a very strong bent toward just leaving other people alone, other than in acts of compassion and charity.

*Those are all parpaphrasing.
Those paraphrases are, in my view, part of the problem with your interpretation. I don't know any theologians who interpret turning the other cheek or removing the speck from your own eye to mean minding your own business and ignoring others.

Really? The last I heard Christians were trying to get evolution kicked out of school.
If it is unfair and bigoted to classify all Muslim as terrorists because of a vocal few (and I believe it is), then it is the same to classify all Christians according to a vocal few.

Furthermore, since you use "The Church" (meaning Vatican, I presume) in other posts above as being equivalent to Christianity, then I should point out that "The Church" has no problem with evolution since the Pope said it's OK and hasn't once, AFAIK, tried to have evolution kicked out of school.

Science is a very specific discipline.
Scientific investigation covers almost every area of pursuit in almost every human endeavor. There are even people here on QT3 who believe that science will eventually be able to explain everthing (including consciousness, etc). That's, like, the anti-specific.

The Roman Empire wouldn't adopt Christianity until 380 AD, or even legalize it until 313 AD (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_ancient_Rome), so Christ, speaking before the end of his thirty-odd-year lifetime starting around 1 AD, is unlikely to have considered Roman soldiers fellow Christians.
Well... perhaps not specifically legalized until the 4th c., but there were certainly times when Christianity was neither legal nor illegal: basically a Roman non-issue. For instance under Tiberius (~14-37AD), which was fortunate since that was the time of Christ ;), Trajan (~98-117AD) who said they could be punished but not killed for failing to honor Roman gods, and Hadrian (~117-138AD) who said Christians had the right to a trial before receiving "street justice". In addition, early Christian writers record many instances of Romans (citizens, soldiers, and senators) converting during those early years. In any case, Christ's message was clearly intended for all as He made clear in the great commission to the apostles of Matthew 28.

All that said, I largely agree with the rest of your post.

So again, show me something Christianity did, that couldn't have been done as well OR BETTER by a non-religious system.
Christianity excels at spreading the message of Christ, and this could certainly not have been done better by a non-religious system.

Lh'owon

07-17-2008, 09:59 PM

And what does this have to do with the price of tea in China*? I'm talking about the perception of a spiritual life, the subjective experience of a person, regardless of the ontological existence of a soul or whatever. If, through religion, a person believes his place in the universe is special and he is loved by God, what does it matter that a minority of all the people in existence have missed out on this belief?

I was formulating a response to this when I saw that Anti-Bunny had already done so, adressing my objection quite well:

Why does it matter? Well, for starters because I happen to have the crazy notion that truth is better than falsehood, regardless of how ugly the truth or how pretty the falsehood, because truth is the foundation on which we build progress... Whether it's material scientific progress, such as improving our quality of life through technology. Intellectual progress, such as developing a more accurate understanding of our own natures and the nature of the world around us, allowing us to forge better lives both individually AND as a society. Or emotional progress, such as coming to grips with unpleasant truths (such as, say, the fundamental failure of a marriage or long-term friendship), allowing us to take the necessary steps to rectify the situation and to emerge as happier and healthier individuals.

When you say that "this makes me feel special, so why does it matter whether its true or not?" You're rejecting a process that is fundamental to ANY meaningful effort to enrich and improve our lives (and, by extension, the lives of our descendants).

I would add that your definition of a spiritual life is hugely demeaning. Apparently having a spiritual life consists of believing an all-powerful entity loves you and that you have a special place in the universe. The first is pathetically needy, the second hopelessly solipsistic. How's that blanket holding up, Linus?

Religion has given people a spiritual life. Historically, religion and spiritual life have gone hand in hand (today, "spiritual" often has a weirdly personal "believe what I want to believe and everything's cool" connotation that serves a very different purpose).

No, religion gives reasons and answers to questions, doubts, desires, life experiences, hopes and emotions. Once people are drawn into the fold, they will turn to their religion as a way of providing the comfort they desire. This is then labelled a 'spiritual life'. This is no different to a non-religious person's life, other than the answers given. There is nothing inherently special about a spiritual life.

Religion answers questions that not-religion cannot, by its very definition, answer.

-Tom

Let's hear 'em!

TomChick

07-17-2008, 10:36 PM

Once people are drawn into the fold, they will turn to their religion as a way of providing the comfort they desire.

I think your cart and horse have jackknifed. :) Some people would say that Man created religion much the same way He created other beautiful things that can also sometimes be ugly.

As for the questions only religion can answer, do you really want a list? Because somehow I think you know exactly what I'm talking about.

-Tom

Lh'owon

07-17-2008, 10:57 PM

I think your cart and horse have jackknifed. :) Some people would say that Man created religion much the same way He created other beautiful things that can also sometimes be ugly.

As for the questions only religion can answer, do you really want a list? Because somehow I think you know exactly what I'm talking about.

-Tom

Heh, I would also say that except that I don't find most of religion to be beautiful. But that's another argument I suppose.

Well, somehow I think you know what my answers to said questions will be, so I'd be more interested in your reasons why said questions are valid ones.*

*But I'd still like a few examples just so I don't become hopelessly confused ;)

TomChick

07-17-2008, 11:23 PM

Well, somehow I think you know what my answers to said questions will be, so I'd be more interested in your reasons why said questions are valid ones.

Are you going to dispute whether it's "valid" to ask what happens to us when we die? What about whether we matter to the universe? What about what sets us apart from animals? What about why you have the capacity to feel love and compassion? Or what about this very simple one: "Why?"

Any asshole can quote Dawkins' answers to those questions and posit that we're all just atoms and firing synapses. But the point isn't that you or I or Anti Bunny or the Mormon at the door has an answer to those questions. The point is *why* people ask those questions and what the answers do to the world.

I believe the answers offered by religion (Christianity and Judaism being the ones I'm most familiar with personally) have made the world a better place than it would have been without them.

-Tom

wildpokerman

07-17-2008, 11:42 PM

Uh, how about "religion"?

I suspect it would be pretty impossible to have a conversation with you about this, though. You seem to be, uh, one of those people, every bit as intractable is a Mormon or Jehovah's Witness, but a lot less polite.

-Tom

Anti bunny is halfway there, lets reposit it as what did Christianity do that couldn't have been done as well in a non-christian system? It's a big leap to think that the advantages of Christianity couldn't have been reaped in the western world without it. Most of the advances in the western world have been caused simply because there has been a huge labor shortfall and more land to be worked than men to work it. That's why we developed a capital structure, property rights, a justice system and so forth because the need to compel men to work has been stronger here than it is in Asia where manpower is more plentiful than land.

And as someone who was raised Mormon yes we are polite.

Okay, how about you explain to me the difference Aristotle has made in the average person's spiritual life? Then multiply that by the number of people who've been on this planet since Aristotle.

If you want to talk about the benefit of Christianity without treating it as a religion, you're missing the point.

-Tom

Are you saying that no one before Christianity was able to have a fufilling spiritual life? No Buddist, Taoist, or Roman or Greek Pagan was able to feel the same feelings or feel like their questions were answered? I would posit that in the absense of Christianity some other relligion would have filled the void and filled it just fine. Yes the world would be different but better or worse is just a conjecture that we can't really argue until time machines and alternative universes are invented. Like I said before those same labor to capital ratios would have existed and the same end results of property rights, scientific exploration and competition would have given us a fairly free capitalist society regardless. I don't see how Christ fits into this picture. In fact I'd say that the restrictions some relligions put on birth control could possibly someday erase this effect.

Are you going to dispute whether it's "valid" to ask what happens to us when we die? What about whether we matter to the universe? What about what sets us apart from animals? What about why you have the capacity to feel love and compassion? Or what about this very simple one: "Why?"

Any asshole can quote Dawkins' answers to those questions and posit that we're all just atoms and firing synapses. But the point isn't that you or I or Anti Bunny or the Mormon at the door has an answer to those questions. The point is *why* people ask those questions and what the answers do to the world.

I believe the answers offered by religion (Christianity and Judaism being the ones I'm most familiar with personally) have made the world a better place than it would have been without them.

-Tom

Don't let this devolve or distract you Tom. Two pages ago we were all discussing your proposition that Christianity makes the world a better place. They set up a strawman of relligion sucks and you're playing right along.

So please tell us, as to your original point, what benefits has Christianity brought to my life that I would not have had without it?

TomChick

07-18-2008, 12:07 AM

what did Christianity do that couldn't have been done as well in a non-christian system?

Wait, wait, I'm not really interested in having a conversation about whether Christianity is better than religion A, B, or C. That's not at all what I'm saying. If you guys want to argue that, then I'll bow out, because I don't pretend to know the comparative merits of world religions. But I do think Catholics would kick the asses of Taoists in a stand-up fight.

Are you saying that no one before Christianity was able to have a fufilling spiritual life? No Buddist, Taoist, or Roman or Greek Pagan was able to feel the same feelings or feel like their questions were answered? I would posit that in the absense of Christianity some other relligion would have filled the void and filled it just fine.

If you say so. I don't think you appreciate perfect storm of culture, theology, and history that gave rise to Christianity, but whatever. I have no interest in playing alternative history games, or Which Religion Is Better. You go through history with the religion you have, not the religion you imagine you could have had.

I don't see how Christ fits into this picture. In fact I'd say that the restrictions some relligions put on birth control could possibly someday erase this effect.

Man, you lost me there...

Two pages ago we were all discussing your proposition that Christianity makes the world a better place. They set up a strawman of relligion sucks and you're playing right along.

Wait, what? I don't know if you realize, but this a really old thread in which I got into a discussion with Phil Steinmeyer about whether anyone who wrote the New Testament had ever met Jesus (the academic consensus is that they hadn't). It's been all over the place, so I'm not sure what you're talking about that happened two pages ago. If you'd like to quote something I wrote, I can probably address it better. But, yeah, I think the world is better off with any given religion -- including Christianity and even Islam -- than without it.

So please tell us, as to your original point, what benefits has Christianity brought to my life that I would not have had without it?

I have no idea and I'm not sure why you're asking me. I've never even met you.

-Tom

Lh'owon

07-18-2008, 12:10 AM

Ah. I'm afraid I am on such an entirely different page - nay, book - than you that I'm not sure I even want to go here. Still...

Are you going to dispute whether it's "valid" to ask what happens to us when we die? What about whether we matter to the universe? What about what sets us apart from animals? What about why you have the capacity to feel love and compassion? Or what about this very simple one: "Why?"

In this case it is the validity of the answers that I question, as I'm sure you know. Those questions are of the utmost importance and I am deeply interested in their answers. I care passionately that if any answers are to be found that they be based on the truth. I make no apologies for that.

Any asshole can quote Dawkins' answers to those questions and posit that we're all just atoms and firing synapses. But the point isn't that you or I or Anti Bunny or the Mormon at the door has an answer to those questions. The point is *why* people ask those questions and what the answers do to the world.

Why such an ugly turn of phrase, Tom? I have considerable contempt for many theologians but I would hesitate before calling a fan of them an asshole. I'll make no secret of being an admirer of Dawkins and agree with much of what he says about the nature of the universe and religion. But I haven't quoted him and I don't have The God Delusion to hand.

I disagree entirely that the "point" is why we ask the questions. That is a very important question, but it is one of many questions about this universe, and to imply that it is the ultimate question is to imply you believe the answer is a religious one. I'm sorry, but no matter how hard you try to make it the default answer, not everyone believes that, and all the evidence points to it not being the case.

I happen to believe we are composed entirely of atoms, or near enough, and that there is no part of our existence that isn't material matter. The difference between you and I is that I don't add the dismissive "just". Without going into detail that is the same as saying the Parthenon is "just" composed of marble. The fact that we are biological organsims of such staggering complexity and that we have evolved out of the lifeless matter of the universe is awe-inspiring and breathtaking in a way religion can only dream of being.

Let me remind you of your statement "Religion answers questions that not-religion cannot, by its very definition, answer."

This is simply not true. The only question you supplied that "not-religion" cannot answer is the last one: "Why?". Science is working on it. And there is every possibility that there is no answer to that question that would mean much to us. That's what "42" meant to me in the Hitchhiker's Guide: There is an answer to the ultimate question (why the universe exists at all) but it is likely to come down to a mathematical equation or a scientific theory, not something that is directly meaningful to humanity.

I believe the answers offered by religion (Christianity and Judaism being the ones I'm most familiar with personally) have made the world a better place than it would have been without them.

-Tom

I believe the opposite. But what I believe more strongly is that there is no real evidence to support the factual claims of said religions - that they are simply not true. And regardless of their effect on the world, that matters to me.

There, we've exchanged beliefs, how polite. :)

TomChick

07-18-2008, 12:32 AM

The only question you supplied that "not-religion" cannot answer...

I figured you'd go there. I'm tempted to be offended, but I think it's pretty short-sighted to write off those questions with scientific answers as if they addressed them. You've missed the point entirely. You don't get to tell people those answers. You figure it out yourself and make your peace or not. And you let other people do the same, within limits, and you encourage the answers that help people be happy.

Also, you're assuming way too much about my beliefs. Although I don't consider it many people's business, I'm a hardcore atheist. When it comes to answering those questions, you and I would probably agree. But -- nothing personal -- it's not the sort of thing I'd discuss on a message board, any more than I'd discuss my love life, seek medical advice, or ask for dating tips. :)

Anyway, I'm out of here. I've got tickets to Batman and you guys have kept me from getting any work done. Jerks.

-Tom

Lh'owon

07-18-2008, 12:45 AM

I figured you'd go there. I'm tempted to be offended, but I think it's pretty short-sighted to write off those questions with scientific answers as if they addressed them. You've missed the point entirely. You don't get to tell people those answers. You figure it out yourself and make your peace or not. And you let other people do the same, within limits, and you encourage the answers that help people be happy.

Woah, okay, now I'm getting you! I apologise. I honestly thought we were arguing about what the objectively (ie outside of anyone's head) true answer to those questions were. I realise now that you believe the true answer to be secondary to what is true for someone; what allows someone to best accept their place in the universe and live their life to the best.

I don't really agree with this, mainly because I believe false beliefs tend to be harmful even if they are seemingly comforting, and I think people are capable of so much more, but that is an entirely different argument.

Also, you're assuming way too much about my beliefs. Although I don't consider it many people's business, I'm a hardcore atheist. When it comes to answering those questions, you and I would probably agree. But -- nothing personal -- it's not the sort of thing I'd discuss on a message board, any more than I'd discuss my love life, seek medical advice, or ask for dating tips. :)

Yea, I was quite conscious that you might not be coming from there yourself, I'm just not a good enough writer to avoid using "you" and still be concise. Sorry! I fully understand, although I'm rather the opposite - er, minus the stuff that isn't personal beliefs.

Anyway, I'm out of here. I've got tickets to Batman and you guys have kept me from getting any work done. Jerks.

-Tom

Man, still haven't seen that. Thanks for the reminder!

RSofaer

07-18-2008, 10:13 AM

At some point, if I can remember to go back and listen to it, there is a Radio Lab program about morality, which quotes research into moral development that seemed to pretty clearly show that moral judgement comes before exposure to religious values, and links it to a phase in neural development as a toddler, I think. On the other hand, I have no sound at work and I probably will forget by the time I go home. If anyone wants to check whether I am remembering this right, here is the link:

http://www.wnyc.org/shows/radiolab/episodes/2006/04/28

By the way, Radio Lab is awesome.

Rimbo

07-18-2008, 11:51 AM

I don't know if you realize, but this a really old thread in which I got into a discussion with Phil Steinmeyer about whether anyone who wrote the New Testament had ever met Jesus (the academic consensus is that they hadn't).

Actually, might I ask a question on that topic?

I just finished a pretty good intro (http://www.amazon.com/Whose-Bible-History-Scriptures-Through/dp/0670033855) to this sort of thing, and one of the comments the author makes is that all of what's in the Bible started out as oral tradition long before it was written down. So the stories were being handed down long before they were written down.

I assume that by saying no one who wrote the NT had ever met Jesus, this is talking about the people who wrote the text, but not necessarily those who came up with the stories.

Yeah it's a silly straw-splitting academic point but humor me okay??? ;)

Rimbo

07-18-2008, 11:57 AM

Although I don't consider it many people's business, I'm a hardcore atheist.

With all due respect, you sound more like a Presbyterian to me.

Although to some folks, there's not much difference between the two.

Alan Friesen

07-18-2008, 01:07 PM

I assume that by saying no one who wrote the NT had ever met Jesus, this is talking about the people who wrote the text, but not necessarily those who came up with the stories.

That's pretty much it. While Jesus was alive, people told stories about him. Shortly after he died, people continued to tell stories about him. Anywhere from 20-60 years later, the Gospels were written, but likely not by people who had actually met him. In fact, as others in this thread have already point out, the Gospels are all based on an earlier text-based source ("Q").

In short: it's pretty clear that Jesus existed, and it's also pretty clear that at least some of the events in the Gospels contain factual elements. Where believers and non-believers disagree is the extent to which the Gospels are factually accurate.

Rimbo

07-18-2008, 01:57 PM

That's pretty much it. While Jesus was alive, people told stories about him. Shortly after he died, people continued to tell stories about him. Anywhere from 20-60 years later, the Gospels were written, but likely not by people who had actually met him. In fact, as others in this thread have already point out, the Gospels are all based on an earlier text-based source ("Q").

Now IIRC that was true for the first 3 but not so much Gospel of John...is that correct?

In short: it's pretty clear that Jesus existed, and it's also pretty clear that at least some of the events in the Gospels contain factual elements. Where believers and non-believers disagree is the extent to which the Gospels are factually accurate.

That's correct for the most part. There are a few believers (hi!) who think of the Gospels (and the Bible in general) as being parables intended to demonstrate a higher truth, not necessarily (nor intended to be) factual recorded accounts of events. There's also a few who don't think Jesus existed, but was potentially an amalgamation of several individuals.

Alan Friesen

07-18-2008, 06:05 PM

Now IIRC that was true for the first 3 but not so much Gospel of John...is that correct?

Sorry, I was unclear: most scholars think that the synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) are based on Q, whereas John is not.

That's correct for the most part. There are a few believers (hi!) who think of the Gospels (and the Bible in general) as being parables intended to demonstrate a higher truth, not necessarily (nor intended to be) factual recorded accounts of events.

Indeed. It's entirely likely that the writer of Genesis, for instance, never intended for the three creation accounts at the beginning of the book to be taken from a factual viewpoint. The chiastic structure of these passages seem to support this theory, though of course it's certainly up for interpretation from those who would like to literally interpret six days to mean six days.

As for the Coptic Judas "gospel" (Gospel?) itself, it shows that early Christianity didn't follow one united path from start to finish. That's what's so neat about texts such as this, that they show the varying belief structures of early Christians and Christian groups. With modern religions like Mormonism, we can clearly see revisionism and development taking place from a multitude of historical documents (blood atonement and polygamism, for instance) over the course of a century, followed by the codification of what are now considerered core beliefs in the religion. We haven't had that clear a picture of early Christianity, except for what's given to us in the epistles of Paul, and now in codices like this that have been rediscovered. Of course, the Judas gospel was written some time in the 4th century CE, still fairly late.

In the end, this gospel will likely be as relevant to the religion as other apocryphal books (Gospel of Thomas, Gospel of Mary, etc.), but in terms of interest in the history of the religion, it's very interesting!

Rimbo

07-18-2008, 11:36 PM

Good points. And it's not just the differences through history, but contemporary differences. My point of view itself, while certainly not mainstream, is not uncommon, either, and is yet another example of that.

You even see this disparity within the Bible itself, which is half the fun. Take the Samuel/Kings vs. Chronicles division in the OT, and the different ways they portray King David. Samuel/Kings was written by Judah in exile, basically to explain, "This is why this happened to us." And you see King David's violent rise to power, his infidelity, his feeblemindedness in old age. Chronicles was written when they returned to the Promised Land after exile in Babylon, and the goal was to glamorize and glorify the old kingdom; Uriah gets nary a mention, and the story is otherwise edited.

You see something similar in the way the stories of Lincoln and Washington are commonly told nowadays -- Lincoln's racism is skipped, and Washington's cherry tree probably never existed. But they are more valuable as symbols of ideals, so the stories are told as they're told.

So even today, this is just the way stories go. It doesn't mean there's no truth there. It's just that historical accuracy was never really the goal.

dermot

07-19-2008, 12:49 AM

shift6:Furthermore, since you use "The Church" (meaning Vatican, I presume) in other posts above as being equivalent to Christianity, then I should point out that "The Church" has no problem with evolution since the Pope said it's OK and hasn't once, AFAIK, tried to have evolution kicked out of school.
I was curious about this so I looked it up recently and the official Catholic stance on evolution is that the body evolved but the soul - which is held as the essence of a person - was created fully-formed by God.

Anti-Bunny reminds me a lot of Dan Brown's "Angels and Demons", which I read once and which drove me to distraction for many reasons. One of the most prominent of these was the fact that much of the book hinges on the idea that the Catholic Church is resolutely anti-science. Now, that may have been true at various times throughout history (and I wonder how much of that was actually Vatican policy and how much was local Church policy) but I distinctly remember being taught chemistry, biology (including evolution) and physics by various Christian Brothers at the secondary school I went to.

Also - and I could very well be wrong about this - but isn't the notion that we should "render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's" a sop to the Romans that was added to the Gospels to make Christianity more palatable to them?

MattKeil

07-19-2008, 03:23 AM

I distinctly remember being taught chemistry, biology (including evolution) and physics by various Christian Brothers at the secondary school I went to.

As was I, at the college I attended. In fact, I first learned about the scholarly consensus that the authors of the Gospels as we know them did not have firsthand knowledge of Jesus or the events of his life from a Christian Brother.

There are a lot of misconceptions about Catholic doctrine and belief, it seems, especially when it comes to education. I was raised Catholic and about half my education was in Catholic schools, and at no time was science disparaged, evolution avoided, or Creationism given any credence whatsoever. I was in my late teens when I learned there are people who don't believe dinosaurs existed, and I was pretty shocked by the news.

The person I first encountered who held that belief, by the way, also thought that Catholics worshipped the Virgin Mary as a goddess.

wisefool

07-19-2008, 06:55 AM

Okay, how about you explain to me the difference Aristotle has made in the average person's spiritual life?

-Tom

Oh, I see what you did there. Trick question.

My take is that Jesus was an alien/time traveller. He keeps talking about "seeds" which sounds awfully like nanotechnology. Turning sugar water into wine? The miracle of yeast. The whole salvation comes from not being born at all? Sounds like genetic problems that could be corrected with gene engineering and clone embryos.

Rimbo

07-19-2008, 09:10 AM

Also - and I could very well be wrong about this - but isn't the notion that we should "render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's" a sop to the Romans that was added to the Gospels to make Christianity more palatable to them?

When a friend of mine took a class on the Bible at UC San Diego, they told him this was the one line in the whole thing that Jesus actually might have really said. But given the indirectness of the source, I could be completely wrong as well.

Anti-Bunny

07-19-2008, 10:59 AM

So... Tom is a 'hardcore atheist' who thinks that anyone who doesn't enrich their lives with a fulfilling set of spiritual beliefs is missing out? Right..

Mordrak

07-19-2008, 11:16 AM

So... Tom is a 'hardcore atheist' who thinks that anyone who doesn't enrich their lives with a fulfilling set of spiritual beliefs is missing out? Right..

Or he could be a hardcore atheist that deals opiates. Heh. They always say, if you deal, never use.

ravenight

07-19-2008, 11:31 AM

It's kind of funny how you sound curiously like a religious zealot, except you spell "truth" with a lower-case "t".

Except that his magic works. When the priests of his religion predict a storm or heat wave, it usually occurs. When they tell you how to cure a disease, you are usually cured.

I believe the answers offered by religion (Christianity and Judaism being the ones I'm most familiar with personally) have made the world a better place than it would have been without them.

So you believe that the religious answers to these questions are more useful than the scientific ones? Or do you just believe, as you say in the quote below, that people need to find their own and if a religion happens to help them find an answer they are happy with, then world is better?

I figured you'd go there. I'm tempted to be offended, but I think it's pretty short-sighted to write off those questions with scientific answers as if they addressed them. You've missed the point entirely. You don't get to tell people those answers. You figure it out yourself and make your peace or not. And you let other people do the same, within limits, and you encourage the answers that help people be happy.

The problem with this is that this isn't what religions do. All you are saying here is that you think the world is better off having more available philosophies than fewer, and that religions happen to provide philosophies. Except that Christianity, in particular, and many other religions as well, have been actively hostile to new philosophy. They don't get a free pass simply because after 1000-1200 years of squashing all competing philosophy the world they controlled was finally wealthy enough per capita to start having a significant number of educated people writing their opinions down and discussing them with each other.

I don't think anyone here is arguing that making your own decisions about what is true in the world is a bad thing (even if you decide there is a supernatural power that arbitrarily decides all outcomes). I actually see a lot of the opposite argument: religion is actively hostile to making up your own mind or seeing the full range of information that you could use to find your own "moral center" (I can't come up with a phrase for this that does sound silly and new-age-y).

I think one of the reasons some people are so hostile to arguments about religious belief is because of cognitive dissonance. They have been indoctrinated with a fundamental belief that certain things are right or true, but they don't understand why or how those things connect, and their beliefs are simply imposed on them. Therefore, when you make a reasonable, understandable argument for why their belief is incorrect or actively bad, the reaction is anger. People who developed their religious beliefs on their own are generally quite civil about disagreements (though they may think your stance means you are going to hell).

The problems I have with religion (and thus the reasons I think it is a negative influence) are not with people who came to their religious beliefs through a process of inquiry and study (or even with those who were indoctrinated), but with those who make an effort to squash inquiry and indoctrinate others. So, for example, I am fine with the idea of Jehovah's Witnesses going door-to-door trying to convince people through arguments and quotes of something they themselves believe (not being fine with this, and then ever arguing something on a message board is pretty hypocritical, IMO).

I am not fine, though, with dogmatic use of tradition and deference to authority as a means of "teaching" belief, especially when it applies to children (and even when it is done for science, math, philosophy, etc, in schools). This is the scholastic tradition that we inherit from Christian oppression of thought (and partially from the decadence of Rome and its focus on copying the masters) - a list of bullet points you are supposed to memorize and recite, but you only get to understand if you find a way to do so on your own.

Anti-Bunny

07-19-2008, 12:17 PM

stuff
I agree with you, but the long bit at the end won't be very persuasive. Especially since someone like Tom would say 'But see, I DID study the shit out of (my) religion, and that makes me better-qualified to judge the merits of religion than all the rest of you put together'.

That's what he could claim, anyway. He would be wrong, of course.

Kraaze

07-19-2008, 12:27 PM

I agree with you, but the long bit at the end won't be very persuasive. Especially since someone like Tom would say 'But see, I DID study the shit out of (my) religion, and that makes me better-qualified to judge the merits of religion than all the rest of you put together'.

That's what he could claim, anyway. He would be wrong, of course.

So Tom is your better on this topic in the area of education, experience and knowledge but he's wrong. Because you say so. With no compelling argument to back it up.

Well I for am persuaded. Thread over, AB wins.

Cubit

07-19-2008, 01:57 PM

I think what Tom and others are getting at here A-B (please correct me if I am wrong), is that the rhetoric you are using is coming close to as close-minded and divisive as any stereotypically bible thumping "your going to hell" evangelical.

I applaud Tom for being able to separate his personal opinions about a belief, and his appreciation for what that belief has contributed to humankind, both good and bad.

But I guess it wouldn't be a message board discussion without extremes on both sides of an issue getting in the way of honest discourse...

TomChick

07-19-2008, 02:41 PM

The problems I have with religion (and thus the reasons I think it is a negative influence) are not with people who came to their religious beliefs through a process of inquiry and study (or even with those who were indoctrinated), but with those who make an effort to squash inquiry and indoctrinate others.

This would be like me rejecting science because of the people killed in Hiroshima. Religion, like any human institution, is a multi-faceted thing. Think of it as a tool or a work of art or a way of looking at the world, as open to misuse as science, patriotism, or blades.

-Tom

Lizard_King

07-19-2008, 03:16 PM

This would be like me rejecting science because of the people killed in Hiroshima.
I think that would be a religious response, and your example one of the many reasons why the whole science and religion comparison can't be taken too far. You can disagree with how science is applied without having to stop believing in it (in fact, there is no conflict between the two at all). You can pretend the same is possible with religion, but only because humans are comfortable with foolish inconsistency and hypocrisy in that field from years of practice.

Religion, like any human institution, is a multi-faceted thing. Think of it as a tool or a work of art or a way of looking at the world, as open to misuse as science, patriotism, or blades.

Religion is a tool for looking at the world like breaking your legs is an asset for running in it. Wait, you guys were having a superficially appealing analogy contest, right?

That's not to say that I don't have a historical appreciation for what religion brings to the table. It wouldn't be such a prevalent pattern across human development if it weren't a success in the aggregate, at least in the evolutionary sense of success. But there's a big difference between an evidence, reason based way of understanding the world that science represents and the means of coping with it, which is where religion comes in. I suppose what we broadly call philosophy falls in between and fills in the middle range of the spectrum, providing a workable bridge for many people.

I don't pretend it's a binary distinction by any means, there's no shortage of examples of pseudoscientific faiths and religionized science. But the spectrum does exist, and I don't think your analogy deals well with the reasons for that.

TomChick

07-19-2008, 03:21 PM

Lizard_King

07-19-2008, 03:25 PM

ravenight

07-20-2008, 12:42 AM

LK, my analogy was specific to ravenight's comment that he rejects religion because of historical instances of religious oppression of free thinking. I didn't intend the analogy to be taken any further.

Well, I don't reject all forms of religious belief on that basis - I was saying that the particular religions that are characterized by consistent, repeated attempt to oppress thought (which turns out to be quite a few of the most popular ones) are bad influences on the world. I don't believe in a intelligent god, but I specifically said that I have no problem with people who have come to believe in one through study and contemplation - as long as they don't attempt to indoctrinate through rote learning and the quashing of inquisitiveness.

Basically, the argument "The bible says X is bad, so don't do it" is a bad one that has lead to a lot of bad decisions. The argument "Einstein (or Adam Smith or Dawkins, etc) said X doesn't happen, so there's no need to study it" is equally bad. The argument "There's a proverb that goes 'yada, yada', which I think makes it clear we should do X" is not a bad one, and neither is the argument that "X doesn't happen, because if it did, then Y and Z would also have to happen, which they clearly don't," and those are the arguments I wish I saw more of.

Rimbo

07-20-2008, 01:11 AM

Ravenight --

I fail to see the difference between

"The bible says X is bad, so don't do it"

and

"There's a proverb that goes 'yada, yada', which I think makes it clear we should do X"

...What am I missing?

ravenight

07-20-2008, 01:36 AM

That one is an argument based on faith in the inherent correctness of the Bible, while the other is a reference to an interesting passage that sheds light on a particular situation. It is the same difference as the one between "Einstein said the speed of light is the limit" and "It is not possible to accelerate a massive object to a speed equal to or greater than the speed of light in finite time, because as the object approaches the speed of light, its mass approaches infinity." In the one case, there is an understanding of a subject and an ability to reason from knowledge, in the other case there is only rote opinion that cannot be adapted.

Rimbo

07-20-2008, 02:22 AM

I still don't quite understand; a "reference to an interesting passage that sheds light" implies that the "interesting passage" is also correct for that situation. Which of course leads to the question of why that "interesting passage" is correct, and how that's in any way different from the former kind.

ravenight

07-20-2008, 02:40 AM

All I mean is that if we are having a discussion about downloading a cracked copy of a game, and you say, "Proverbs teaches us: 'So are the ways of everyone who commits robbery; it will take away the life of its owner,' thus even if it's easy and safe to steal this thing, I don't think we should do it, because it's a slippery path," then that's an actual argument. Whereas if you simply say, "Thou shalt not steal," it is a rote argument with no heft to it.

Rimbo

07-20-2008, 03:01 AM

Right now the only thing I have that really shows a difference between the two is your assertion that they are different. In the case of a Scientific fact, for example, if I really have to, I can go run an experiment that proves it myself; I can tell Einstein, "I don't believe it until I see it for myself," and it's perfectly proper for me to do so. Quoting Proverbs and quoting Exodus really aren't different unless you think Proverbs is inherently correct and Exodus isn't; however, even in that case, you're still accepting a portion of scripture as authoritative.

There are reasons why one might treat the two scriptures differently. A believer gives weight to "Thou shalt not steal" because it is part of the original deal God made with Israel; it's akin to your Mom saying, "Do not play baseball in doors near the Ming vase." This of course assume that you believe in Moses' God, that God made a deal with Moses, that this was part of the deal and that it is still valid today. (There's other reasons one could believe it, but that's just one example.)

The Proverbs quote is different in the sense that it's more saying, "If you choose this path, your life will be more difficult." This doesn't require belief in God, but that doesn't mean it can go unexamined, any more than if I'd said, "If you play tennis, you run the risk of growing a third testicle."

So I see where you might find a difference between those two specific examples and similar examples taken from Israelite Law and from Proverbs, because one is meant to be a legal code and the other is meant to be aphorisms. But as far as your analogy goes, you are drawing from the authority of scripture in both cases, whereas with your Scientific analogy you're (rather incorrectly) drawing from the authority of Einstein in the one and (correctly) showing how things actually work in the other. Or put another way, Proverbs is not the explanation for the Ten Commandments in the same way that evidence and Math are the explanation for Relativity.

ravenight

07-20-2008, 03:51 AM

Proverbs is not the explanation for the Ten Commandments in the same way that evidence and Math are the explanation for Relativity.

As a whole, no, but the passage I quoted gives a reason for one of the commandments to be obeyed, and can be used as a guide to further behavior in the same way that actually understanding the math of relativity allows you to understand principles derived from it, while simply memorizing a particular statement doesn't.

If I quote Proverbs 1:19 as the basis for my decision, and your response is that you don't think the passage is accurate (for example, maybe in your experience or according some study you've read it is quite possible to lead a balanced and healthy life despite being a criminal), then we can have a discussion about the merits of that passage and the evidence for and against the idea of a slippery slope. If I'm unwilling to have such a discussion, because I believe that something the Bible says must by definition be True, then I'm just in that same camp as the person who says, "Thou shalt not steal." So it isn't that the Proverbs are wiser or more rational per se, it is that they at least contain explanations of the advice they are giving, whereas Commandments and the boiled down statements of religious leaders tend not to (in other words, they do a terrible job with the "why" that Tom refers to, since their answer is simply, "God said so, and you can't argue with Him.")

Grifman

07-20-2008, 12:04 PM

Anti-Bunny

07-20-2008, 12:26 PM

Of course, it's not like atheism ever did that, is it?
No. As atheism is generally a side-effect of other philosophies, it is a conclusion, not a premise. You go through a rationalist critique of a religion a la Hume (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hume). Or you observe the problems with a religion's view of the world using empirical scientific techniques.. Or whatever else what might be the case, and you come to atheism at the end. There have been philosophies that also advocated atheism that were about crushing inquiry, criticism and so on, but atheism wasn't the reason for that crushing of dissent. The parent philosophy (communism, for example) was.

Rimbo

07-20-2008, 12:41 PM

If I quote Proverbs 1:19 as the basis for my decision, and your response is that you don't think the passage is accurate (for example, maybe in your experience or according some study you've read it is quite possible to lead a balanced and healthy life despite being a criminal), then we can have a discussion about the merits of that passage and the evidence for and against the idea of a slippery slope. If I'm unwilling to have such a discussion, because I believe that something the Bible says must by definition be True, then I'm just in that same camp as the person who says, "Thou shalt not steal." So it isn't that the Proverbs are wiser or more rational per se, it is that they at least contain explanations of the advice they are giving, whereas Commandments and the boiled down statements of religious leaders tend not to (in other words, they do a terrible job with the "why" that Tom refers to, since their answer is simply, "God said so, and you can't argue with Him.")

I get what you're saying.

In the context of the Bible, the Ten Commandments and the Law do provide explanations for why people should do these things; the Covenant itself is in the same format of Covenants between ordinary folk and Lords of the day, where the people agree to do certain things and the Lord agrees to do certain things.

I guess the point is that the sort of person who won't explain this is also the sort of person who wouldn't bother discussing the reasons behind the Proverb; whereas the sort of person who would discuss the validity of the proverb would also discuss the validity of the text of the Law. The prohibitions in the Law against eating pork, allowing sorceresses to live, and shaving are good examples of laws that even the most unreasonable Fundamentalists don't consider valid for various reasons.

To some extent the Bible itself is used for these reasons -- e.g. for the prohibition against eating pork, most Christians agree that Jesus' "It's not what goes into a man's mouth that makes him unclean, but what comes out of it" ended the need for that. But I think understanding the Bible begins with understanding the context in which it all came about, which necessarily requires knowledge that isn't in the Bible. Not only is this not unusual, it's a big part of the tradition of Scripture; interpretation of the written word has always been a big chunk of the deal.

Even for Fundamentalists.

Rimbo

07-20-2008, 12:45 PM

No. As atheism is generally a side-effect of other philosophies, it is a conclusion, not a premise.

One must assume a specific definition of "God" in order to reach any such conclusion. Thus it's a conclusion that is valid in the same way that Pascal's Wager is valid.

Lh'owon

07-20-2008, 02:10 PM

One must assume a specific definition of "God" in order to reach any such conclusion. Thus it's a conclusion that is valid in the same way that Pascal's Wager is valid.

That's just obfuscation. The definition of the god atheists reject is simple: a personal god who listens to prayers and takes an active interest in human affairs. If this doesn't fit your picture of God then you aren't talking about the Christian God.

Perhaps that makes atheism a specific conclusion, but it's still a conclusion, and one that rejects the God that nearly all religious people believe in.

Bahimiron

07-20-2008, 02:18 PM

The definition of the god atheists reject is simple: a personal god who listens to prayers and takes an active interest in human affairs.

That's an odd definition of atheism.

So if I believe that the Earth is the divine egg of a great cosmic sea turtle and soon it will hatch and we will all be taken out to the universal ocean where we will be united with the ten thousand other Earths, I'm an atheist because I don't believe that our creator, Zagoogoo the Turtle, participates in human affairs.

Anti-Bunny

07-20-2008, 02:29 PM

That's an odd definition of atheism.

I agree. Lh'owon could be describing a deist, for instance.

Atheism doesn't mean rejecting ONLY the christian god. All christians are equally atheistic when it comes to Thor, Odin, Shiva, Amaterasu, Tiamat, etc. If you do not -actively- believe in a given god, you're an atheist at least towards that god. If you do not actively believe in any gods, then you are an atheist in general. If you go one step further, from lack of -active- belief to active -disbelief-, you are a SUBSET of atheist referred to as a strong or explicit atheist.

The main problem with the confusion is that "agnostic" gets mis-used and abused... it's used in everyday conversation to mean the broader set of atheist because "atheism" is a scarier word.

Lh'owon

07-20-2008, 02:34 PM

That's an odd definition of atheism.

So if I believe that the Earth is the divine egg of a great cosmic sea turtle and soon it will hatch and we will all be taken out to the universal ocean where we will be united with the ten thousand other Earths, I'm an atheist because I don't believe that our creator, Zagoogoo the Turtle, participates in human affairs.

That would be A'Tuin, actually.

Way to miss the point entirely. The definition I just gave is a way of pinning down exactly what god we are talking about – often believers use the argument that atheists are rejecting a simple, man-in-the-sky God, one that sophisticated believers such as them simply don't believe in. Saying it's a "personal god" we atheists reject shows that we are rejecting the god they believe in, because there's no real way for them to believe in a non-personal god and still be Christian, Muslim etc.

Of course most atheists don't believe in any of the countless possible manifestations of God, personal or impersonal. It still makes atheism basically a conclusion: I don't believe that X deity exists.

EDIT: Reading that post again I see I didn't really make it clear enough that I wasn't giving a complete definition of atheism.

MattKeil

07-20-2008, 02:48 PM

Of course most atheists don't believe in any of the countless possible manifestations of God, personal or impersonal. It still makes atheism basically a conclusion: I don't believe that X deity exists.

I know you can find countless (and very loud) examples of such atheists on the internet, but I would say far more (certainly the ones I know) would say "I see no reason to believe that X deity exists."

Lh'owon

07-20-2008, 03:04 PM

I know you can find countless (and very loud) examples of such atheists on the internet, but I would say far more (certainly the ones I know) would say "I see no reason to believe that X deity exists."

Which is different how? I mean really, what are you possibly trying to say here?

You people give me so many opportunities to say "obfuscate", but I really like saying that word so that's OK. When I say I don't believe in God it is in the same way that I don't believe in fairies. I see no evidence for their existence, therefore I see no reason to believe in them, and so I don't believe in them.

It isn't at all an admission of certainty if that's what you're getting at.

madkevin

07-20-2008, 03:57 PM

I wonder how many posts it will be before Rimbo plays his "atheism and religion are the same thing!!!!!" card.

Rimbo

07-20-2008, 07:57 PM

It isn't at all an admission of certainty if that's what you're getting at.

See, now this is an interesting thing for you to say. And I think it gets to the heart of what offended Tom about Anti-Bunny's posts; while I can't speak for either of them, I believe Tom's dismissal of Anti-Bunny came from a feeling Tom got that Anti-Bunny was confessing to be certain in his beliefs. I could be mistaken, but I think this is what happened there.

To me, the hallmark of Fundamentalism is its arrogant certainty. Fundamentalists declare, "We believe that certain things are true, and nothing you can say can prove to us otherwise."

I believe that one of the tenets of Science and the Scientific Method is that no man can say this about anything; any given scientific fact is always just an experiment away from being proven otherwise. Granted, you're going to have to have some pretty stout proof to disprove certain things, but that doesn't mean the evidence isn't there, waiting to be discovered.

Lh'owon

07-20-2008, 08:26 PM

I believe that one of the tenets of Science and the Scientific Method is that no man can say this about anything; any given scientific fact is always just an experiment away from being proven otherwise. Granted, you're going to have to have some pretty stout proof to disprove certain things, but that doesn't mean the evidence isn't there, waiting to be discovered.

Yes, of course, but it doesn't mean the evidence is there either, or that, in the case of certain theories such as evolution, it's worth dwelling on the tiny chance that it might be.

I should be clear that while I don't admit certainty (as you point out it is doubtful one can be certain about anything) I am as "certain" that God doesn't exist as I am that fairies or mermaids don't exist. After all there is exactly the same amount of evidence for all three: none.

Out of interest, you say Fundamentalists declare, "We believe that certain things are true, and nothing you can say can prove to us otherwise." What would it take for a moderate believer to be convinced (I think "prove" is too loaded) that God doesn't exist?

Rimbo

07-21-2008, 01:18 AM

Yes, of course, but it doesn't mean the evidence is there either, or that, in the case of certain theories such as evolution, it's worth dwelling on the tiny chance that it might be.

Yes, and that's a great example; the changes to evolutionary theory are pretty much all going to happen on the far edges, not to the main idea as a whole.

What would it take for a moderate believer to be convinced (I think "prove" is too loaded) that God doesn't exist?

I think most moderate believers who become atheists do so because they come to believe over time that things they based their belief on were bogus, and they eventually just run out of reasons to believe. I'd say this is preferable to failing to either examine one's beliefs or examining them or to rejecting the result because it makes one feel uncomfortable.

ravenight

07-21-2008, 03:35 AM

Even for Fundamentalists.

Thinking, analytic fundamentalists do discuss the basis of certain of their traditions, and they are capable of deciding that some things in the Bible supercede others. However, their arguments start from an assumption that certain things are true, and rely on that assumption to be at all reasonable. The Ten Commandments and Leviticus being part of a covenant with God and thus the explanation for their validity being simply, "God wants these things as payment for freeing us, or because in exchange, he won't kill us all again," does not make for a reason one can use to find the correct path in life. Arguing about whether God really wants arbitrary thing A or arbitrary thing B is silly and useless. Arguing that the Bible makes a good point when it says you should burn the dead or forgive those who have wronged you, as a starting point for a discussion of the positive results of those things is different.

Of course, it's not like atheism ever did that, is it?

If you look at my previous posts, I actually explicitly said that it irritates me just as much when it is done in schools as a way of learning math, science or even history. However, organized religion has, for the most part, been strongly dedicated to rote learning and unquestioning faith, as opposed to modern non-theistic school learning, which has a fairly strong tradition of questioning assumption, search for root causes and understanding the reasoning behind a "fact".

To me, the hallmark of Fundamentalism is its arrogant certainty. Fundamentalists declare, "We believe that certain things are true, and nothing you can say can prove to us otherwise."

I'm not sure Fundamentalism and unquestioning belief are synonymous. Fundamentalism is more about strict adherence to all the rules associated with a particular religion, whereas there are still plenty of non-fundamentalist believers, who pick and choose the rules that make sense to them, but still share certain core beliefs that cannot be disproven.

Grifman

07-21-2008, 05:24 PM

No. As atheism is generally a side-effect of other philosophies, it is a conclusion, not a premise. You go through a rationalist critique of a religion a la Hume (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hume). Or you observe the problems with a religion's view of the world using empirical scientific techniques.. Or whatever else what might be the case, and you come to atheism at the end. There have been philosophies that also advocated atheism that were about crushing inquiry, criticism and so on, but atheism wasn't the reason for that crushing of dissent. The parent philosophy (communism, for example) was.

I would disagree with the idea that you can treat atheism separate from what you call the "parent" philosophy. Marxism/Leninism/Communism are atheistic at their core - I'm not clear how you separate atheism from them. In fact how do you know which is the "parent". Did Marx come up with Marxism first and then add atheism or did Marxism flow from his atheism? From what I've read of Marxism, it had many of the characteristics of a religion, it's just that there's no God. In fact in college one our final exams questions was to compare Marxism to religion, which we had discussed and debated at length in class. And it's pretty much a fact that wherever atheism has become the equivalent of a "state religion" it has always sought to eliminate any free religious belief - USSR, Communist China, North Korea, Eastern Europe, Cambodia, etc.. That's not a record that leaves me to believe they can be easily separated. I'd be interested to see how you think they can be separated.

ravenight

07-21-2008, 05:39 PM

Did Marx come up with Marxism first and then add atheism or did Marxism flow from his atheism?

Well, let's see: are all Marxists atheists or are all atheists Marxists (or both)?

From what I've read of Marxism, it had many of the characteristics of a religion, it's just that there's no God. In fact in college one our final exams questions was to compare Marxism to religion, which we had discussed and debated at length in class. And it's pretty much a fact that wherever atheism has become the equivalent of a "state religion" it has always sought to eliminate any free religious belief - USSR, Communist China, North Korea, Eastern Europe, Cambodia, etc.. That's not a record that leaves me to believe they can be easily separated. I'd be interested to see how you think they can be separated.

You just listed everywhere where some form of Communism became the dominant government, so all you are saying is that in every instance where a country was Communist and atheist, it was difficult to separate Communism from atheism.

MattKeil

07-21-2008, 07:20 PM

Which is different how? I mean really, what are you possibly trying to say here?

Basically that putting it that way at least leaves open the possibility that, should reason one day arise, you'd be open to it. It's not necessarily different in terms of what one believes, but it does tend to make people a little less defensive, at least in my experience. For some reason many people take the flat statement "I don't believe in god" as an admission of lost faith or some kind of religious collapse. "I see no reason to believe in god" seems to couch it more as an act of contemplation, which perhaps sits better with spiritual people.

Aforementioned reason arising is about as likely as all of us waking up as salamanders tomorrow morning, but still.

Lh'owon

07-21-2008, 07:28 PM

Ah right, I get you. I'm afraid I don't tend to go out of my way to make religious people people feel comfortable as it's an issue I feel quite strongly about. I always want to make it clear that I truly don't think there is any rational reason to believe in any god, which is why I don't usually qualify statements such as "I don't believe in God".

Ninja EDIT: Here's a Douglas Adams quote which relates nicely (he is explaining why he calls himself a "radical atheist"):

Yes, I think I use the term “radical” rather loosely, just for emphasis. If you describe yourself as “atheist,” some people will say, “Don’t you mean ‘agnostic’?” I have to reply that I really do mean atheist, I really do not believe that there is a god; in fact, I am convinced that there is not a god (a subtle difference). I see not a shred of evidence to suggest that there is one ... etc., etc. It’s easier to say that I am a radical atheist, just to signal that I really mean it, have thought about it a great deal, and that it’s an opinion I hold seriously.

TomChick

07-21-2008, 07:34 PM

"When I'm discussing religion, I'm afraid I don't tend to go out of my way to make non-religious people people feel comfortable, as it's an issue I feel quite strongly about. I always want to make it clear that I truly have faith, which is why I don't usually qualify statements such as "I believe in God"."

-Tom

Lh'owon

07-21-2008, 07:47 PM

Very good Tom, well spotted.

But you see with the question "Is there a God?" there can only be one correct answer. There is absolutely no middle ground whatsoever. The answer is an entirely factual one: either there is a god, or there isn't. And considering the complete lack of evidence in favour of the former, I feel justified in stating my opinion on the (completely factual) matter without reservation.

Also, compare "don't think there is any rational reason" with "truly have faith" – call me close-minded, but I don't consider faith to be a valid way of drawing accurate conclusions about the nature of the universe.

TomChick

07-21-2008, 07:52 PM

Lh'owon

07-21-2008, 08:18 PM

I'm sure you could, but now you're just being frivolous. You cannot in any seriousness be equating faith with rational enquiry when dealing with the fundamental questions of the universe. When has faith (and I'll leave it up to you to define exactly what that is) ever drawn accurate verifiable conclusions about anything that isn't subjective?

My argument is that any accurate conclusions we have ever drawn about reality have come from rational, evidence-based scientific endeavor. Your argument seems to be that when it comes to God this simply doesn't apply; belief is a justification for belief, and because someone believes something their belief is automatically credible. Sorry but I take reality a little more seriously than that!

Normally I don't like quote-dropping but I was reading an interview with Douglas Adams and this quote is far too appropriate to pass up:

I don’t accept the currently fashionable assertion that any view is automatically as worthy of respect as any equal and opposite view. My view is that the moon is made of rock. If someone says to me “Well, you haven’t been there, have you? You haven’t seen it for yourself, so my view that it is made of Norwegian Beaver Cheese is equally valid” - then I can’t even be bothered to argue. There is such a thing as the burden of proof, and in the case of god, as in the case of the composition of the moon, this has shifted radically. God used to be the best explanation we’d got, and we’ve now got vastly better ones. God is no longer an explanation of anything, but has instead become something that would itself need an insurmountable amount of explaining. So I don’t think that being convinced that there is no god is as irrational or arrogant a point of view as belief that there is. I don’t think the matter calls for even-handedness at all.

The point is unless you can make a convincing case why faith isn't simply belief despite the evidence, and why it should be a credible alternative to scientific enquiry, then you don't have an argument at all.

I absolutely reject your claim that anything I've said is blind intolerance. I'm sure anyone is capable of blind intolerance, myself very much included, but until you can spot a genuine instance of this it strikes me as an attempt to smuggle "faith" equal credibility that it doesn't deserve.

TomChick

07-21-2008, 08:36 PM

You cannot in any seriousness be equating faith with rational enquiry when dealing with the fundamental questions of the universe.

What I was doing was pointing out how people behave when they consider their world view to be the One True Perspective That Cannot Be Disputed. Such people have a way of talking past each other and accomplishing a whole lot of nothing. Which isn't really a big deal, since they rarely have any interest in civil discourse, much less understanding one another.

-Tom

P.S. Dude, Douglas Adams? May I suggest graduating up to Carl Sagan? :)

Bahimiron

07-21-2008, 08:37 PM

countzero

07-21-2008, 08:44 PM

The point is unless you can make a convincing case why faith isn't simply belief despite the evidence, and why it should be a credible alternative to scientific enquiry, then you don't have an argument at all.

I'm a bit late to the party and maybe I didn't understand correctly what you wrote in the last pages but I think you mistake categories:
Fatih as alternative to science is of course rather weak and gives faith a function it only claimed in very unfortunate constellations of religion and power (with the results everybody knows and quotes again and again).
On the other hand to claim that God doesn't exist because you can't find what you call scientific evidence for God is the same game the other way round. You speak of evidence you don't have. God is not a thesis you can verify or falsify. It's a matter of interpreting the world:
You can say that love is just biology and chemistry, that caring and helping are social mechanisms, a social contract or whatever. Or you can say that love, caring, our search for the good and the beautiful is something that hint to a reality deeper than the one we see. In both cases you can argue fairly reasonable why it makes sense to believe in one of them. You can show that a certain faith/interpretation is inconsistent or inconsequent, but faith in itself is not falsified just because Gagarin said he didn't see him in space.
Oh, and about the "fundamental questions of the universes": Faith doesn't claim to know when or how it started but why it started. The other questions are for scientists and as far as I know there are some presumptions that are suspiscously close to believe (but I may be wrong).

Lh'owon

07-21-2008, 09:01 PM

What I was doing was pointing out how people behave when they consider their world view to be the One True Perspective That Cannot Be Disputed. Such people have a way of talking past each other and accomplishing a whole lot of nothing. Which isn't really a big deal, since they rarely have any interest in civil discourse, much less understanding one another.

-Tom

P.S. Dude, Douglas Adams? May I suggest graduating up to Carl Sagan? :)

You see Tom, I got that. I absolutely agree.

But I made an honest attempt to explain why I believe what I do, I really did. All you seem to do is imply that expressing my view strongly is fundamentally intolerant. I have repeatedly asked questions that give you the perfect opportunity to explain why you think what you do and what I am not understanding.

People who think that one must place other people's beliefs on an equal footing and respect them as such, and that to not do so is intolerant, never even begin discourse, civil or not.

P.S. I don't think Carl Sagan has your back here. And dude, don't dismiss the source without engaging the argument, especially when you give no reason why you think the source flawed.

You can't convince a believer of anything; for their belief is not based on evidence, it's based on a deep seated need to believe.

Lh'owon

07-21-2008, 09:21 PM

On the other hand to claim that God doesn't exist because you can't find what you call scientific evidence for God is the same game the other way round. You speak of evidence you don't have. God is not a thesis you can verify or falsify. It's a matter of interpreting the world:

Not really. What I am saying is that God doesn't provide any answers that aren't answered by science. Yes, there are areas where science simply doesn't have verified answers as yet (the very start of life for one) but saying "God did it" isn't a credible answer any more. I'm not at all saying there is evidence against the existence of God – it is the absence of evidence I'm talking about.

In other words the burden of proof is thoroughly on the shoulders of those who believe in God. Science has shown us that the material wold functions just fine without any supernatural input whatsoever. Which of course doesn't logically mean there isn't a God, but again, burden of proof.

You can say that love is just biology and chemistry, that caring and helping are social mechanisms, a social contract or whatever. Or you can say that love, caring, our search for the good and the beautiful is something that hint to a reality deeper than the one we see. In both cases you can argue fairly reasonable why it makes sense to believe in one of them.

Well the biological explanation (and there are many) has evidence to support it, very convincing evidence in some cases, and the faith-based one does not. I just think that evolutionary biology has shown us how such emotions can evolve without external input, so why believe in something else?

Alan Friesen

07-21-2008, 09:21 PM

You cannot in any seriousness be equating faith with rational enquiry when dealing with the fundamental questions of the universe. When has faith (and I'll leave it up to you to define exactly what that is) ever drawn accurate verifiable conclusions about anything that isn't subjective?

Why do the "fundamental questions of the universe" require verifiable answers? (Perhaps you'd like to define for us what you think these questions are.) Why are the answers to said questions necessarily objective? Why do you think that faith is useless because it cannot provide objective answers and verifiable conclusions to important questions?

Lh'owon, you seem to be placing an inordinate amount of emphasis on that which can be verified and proven. You need to wrap your mind around the fact that there are some (!) people on the planet that don't need something to be factually verified before they call it "Truth." I can find beauty, awe, and truth in a well-written short story or song without needing to pinpoint the chemical reactions in my brain that cause me to feel this way.

Sure, there are likely verifiable, proven answers for questions like "How did we get here?" "What started this universe?" and so on, but those questions are less relevant to me on a day-by-day basis than "Why does an amazing woman like my wife love me?" or "How is it that I feel this incredible amount of joy when my 10-month-old daughter smiles at me?"

Materialism might be a dominant philosophical perspective, but it is by no means the only one. You're right: faith isn't a valid way of drawing accurate conclusions about the nature of the universe, but that doesn't mean it isn't a worthwhile way to consider our existence.

Rimbo

07-21-2008, 09:30 PM

I'm not sure Fundamentalism and unquestioning belief are synonymous. Fundamentalism is more about strict adherence to all the rules associated with a particular religion, whereas there are still plenty of non-fundamentalist believers, who pick and choose the rules that make sense to them, but still share certain core beliefs that cannot be disproven.

Your second definition, the one you attribute to "non-fundamentalist believers," is actually the proper definition of Fundamentalists, especially with regard to Christianity: The name, and the ideal itself, comes from a series of pamphlets known as "The Fundamentals" which were published as a reaction to changes in theology occurring as a result of the Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment thought. The statement was very much, "You can question whatever you like, just not THIS." And that is the key to Fundamentalism, at least as far as Christianity is concerned.

In the church I went to until college, everything was up for debate, including the very existence and nature of God.

Sidd_Budd

07-21-2008, 09:39 PM

My argument is that any accurate conclusions we have ever drawn about reality have come from rational, evidence-based scientific endeavor. Your argument seems to be that when it comes to God this simply doesn't apply; belief is a justification for belief, and because someone believes something their belief is automatically credible. Sorry but I take reality a little more seriously than that!
You've got a key assumption embedded in your statements here that I believe is worth highlighting. To me, it seems as though you are making a metaphysical assumption that reality consists only of things that are empirically measurable. If this assumption is true, then of course science is the best tool for drawing conclusions; the scientific method is great at examining empirical phenomena. But that doesn't mean that's all there is.

If there are aspects of reality that are not empirical, science can't be used to investigate these aspects, because the requirements to use the scientific method haven't been met. You need other methods of investigation to draw accurate conclusions. It may very well be that humans can't get the same degree of accuracy about non-empirical reality, because we don't have an equivalent to the scientific method for these phenomena.

It's my belief that religious systems have systems of inquiry that attempt to address these non-empirical issues. These systems have answers to questions that science can't directly address, like "What happens to a non-corporeal part of me after death," and "What's the best way to deal with a person who treats you poorly." The answers to these questions may be part of the fabric of ultimate reality, so it might be worthwhile to have more investigative tools than just the scientific method in one's toolbox.

Of course, you are free to decide that ultimate reality is simply the sum total of phenomena which are verifiable by the scientific method. Just realize that the preceding statement cannot itself be verified with the scientific method, and therefore can't be part of ultimate reality.

Lh'owon

07-21-2008, 11:07 PM

Why do the "fundamental questions of the universe" require verifiable answers? (Perhaps you'd like to define for us what you think these questions are.) Why are the answers to said questions necessarily objective? Why do you think that faith is useless because it cannot provide objective answers and verifiable conclusions to important questions?

What I meant by "fundamental questions" was explanations for how the universe works and how the various phenomena of the universe came into being and how they operate. I realise now that believers could take that as "Why is there anything at all?" and immediately say "God!" or what have you. Your second question seems to question the nature of reality itself; do you really think answers to questions such as how the universe formed or how life came to be could be subjective? I honestly don't understand this. What happened happened in a certain way, whether through natural process or the will of God. That is entirely objective, unless you're getting at something I'm not seeing.

I haven't said faith is useless full stop (that would be another argument – briefly I think anything that involves introspection and reflection can be useful to someone personally, but that doesn't make it special) I have merely said it is useless at understanding objective reality.

Lh'owon, you seem to be placing an inordinate amount of emphasis on that which can be verified and proven. You need to wrap your mind around the fact that there are some (!) people on the planet that don't need something to be factually verified before they call it "Truth." I can find beauty, awe, and truth in a well-written short story or song without needing to pinpoint the chemical reactions in my brain that cause me to feel this way.

I take truth with a capital T to mean objective truth, and I do find it a little odd that someone could be that confident in their belief in something and not have any basis in evidence.

Now of course one can "believe in" beauty, love, and awe, but in a way that is based on evidence – the evidence that you feel in a certain way at certain times, and you see this reciprocated and mirrored in other people. And no, you can't say "Well I feel that I believe that God exists, therefore that's evidence" because that's only evidence of belief in God, not of God's existence. Even more important is the distinction that believing in love isn't an explanation of love – it doesn't make any claims as to what love is or where it came from etc. etc.

Sure, there are likely verifiable, proven answers for questions like "How did we get here?" "What started this universe?" and so on, but those questions are less relevant to me on a day-by-day basis than "Why does an amazing woman like my wife love me?" or "How is it that I feel this incredible amount of joy when my 10-month-old daughter smiles at me?"

Absolutely. I should be clear that I am only talking about objective questions regarding the nature of life and the universe. You'd have to be crazy to try to base everything you do on hard scientific evidence!

It would be unwise, however, to conclude from your examples that God exists. It doesn't logically follow at all, and science DOES have answers to those questions. They just aren't particularly meaningful answers on a day-by-day basis :P

Materialism might be a dominant philosophical perspective, but it is by no means the only one. You're right: faith isn't a valid way of drawing accurate conclusions about the nature of the universe, but that doesn't mean it isn't a worthwhile way to consider our existence.

I certainly wouldn't begrudge anyone a method of considering their existence. Far from it. It's just that so many draw what they believe to be accurate conclusions about the universe from faith.

Lh'owon

07-21-2008, 11:27 PM

Man, I'm kind of tired but I'll try to tackle this. You guys raise interesting points, I appreciate it.

To me, it seems as though you are making a metaphysical assumption that reality consists only of things that are empirically measurable. If this assumption is true, then of course science is the best tool for drawing conclusions; the scientific method is great at examining empirical phenomena. But that doesn't mean that's all there is.

This is of course true, at least in theory. I would tentatively suggest however that there is no gap in our knowledge of the universe (at least in regards to human life, which is the issue at hand) which can't be measured empirically, or at least make sense within a physical view of the universe. In other words our scientific knowledge of human life is in theory complete (although not in detail). So if there is a non-physical part of the universe it would have to influence us physically or we wouldn't be affected by it at all. It may as well not exist, as far as we're concerned.

I don't think I explained that well, so to make it simple: Occam's razor comes into play – we should accept the theory that introduces the fewest assumptions and postulates the fewest entities, and seeing as we do have physical explanations (often incomplete) for all aspects of life, those quite clearly will survive the razor. Non-physical explanations make huge assumptions and usually postulate at least one entity. ;)

It's my belief that religious systems have systems of inquiry that attempt to address these non-empirical issues. These systems have answers to questions that science can't directly address, like "What happens to a non-corporeal part of me after death," and "What's the best way to deal with a person who treats you poorly." The answers to these questions may be part of the fabric of ultimate reality, so it might be worthwhile to have more investigative tools than just the scientific method in one's toolbox.

As I explained above, this is basically all based on fairly groundless assumptions. There is no reason to believe in "non-empirical issues". Of course science can't answer your first question, but that's because there's no reason to believe in a non-corporeal part of the body. I don't see how the second question relates to the topic at all.

Of course, you are free to decide that ultimate reality is simply the sum total of phenomena which are verifiable by the scientific method. Just realize that the preceding statement cannot itself be verified with the scientific method, and therefore can't be part of ultimate reality.

Occam's Razor is a wonderful tool.

countzero

07-21-2008, 11:34 PM

I certainly wouldn't begrudge anyone a method of considering their existence. Far from it. It's just that so many draw what they believe to be accurate conclusions about the universe from faith.
Hmm, who are you aiming at? I mean the guys who believe dinosaurs never existed and the history of man started with two people running through a garden eating fruit aren't that common in Germany, so I can't say that I met a lot of people who do that. Rather the opposite, there are a lot of good European theologians who take science as a dialogue partner. The modern dialogue betwen natural sciences and theology begins with acknowledging what you can talk about in your own science.
So all you say is: You cannot prove that God exists. Well, ok, no problem. And: Theology isn't a substitute for physics, chemistry, astronomy etc. Good, fine, no objection. But what religion/faith talks about is not about the Big Bang (which isn't the same as creation in a religious sense) but reflecting on the human desire for "more than meets the eye" (sorry for the romantic expression, my English get's in the way of scientific discourse), it makes statements about completely different subjects than natural sciences and involves a lot of human experience in coping with difficulties, questions about the meaning of life etc. To demand for these questions the same rules as for natural sciences would be plain reductionism. It would be a bit like wife saying to husband: "I love you" and he just answering "Yeah, but you can't prove it" - which is true but somehow misses the point.

StGabe

07-21-2008, 11:39 PM

You've got a key assumption embedded in your statements here that I believe is worth highlighting.

To turn that on its head...

If there are aspects of reality that are not empirical, science can't be used to investigate these aspects, because the requirements to use the scientific method haven't been met.Your key assumptions:

1) That things defined to be unknowable and impossible to experience are worth considering.

2) That it even makes sense to try "other means" of investigating these.

I think the argument that "we can define problems that are, by definition, insolvable by science" is about as silly as "can god make a rock so heavy that even he can't lift it". It's just so much wordplay. If you bother thinking about it, you realize that the concept you're espousing didn't even really make sense to begin with.

P.S. I read the start of this thread, and the end, but not the middle. I may be missing context. :-)

Anti-Bunny

07-22-2008, 04:51 AM

I'm yanking your chain a bit, but I'm also suggesting that people like you have just as much capacity for blind intolerance as the extremely religious.

Yes, the poor religious fanatics being picked on by the blind intolerance of reason. Those meany atheists are so mean! also, posting dinosaurs pics now:
http://www.qwantz.com/comics/comic2-945.png

Rimbo

07-22-2008, 10:49 AM

Yes, the poor religious fanatics being picked on by the blind intolerance of reason.

The only one mistaking your rhetoric for reason is you. Also, I see your Dinosaur Comic and raise (lower?) you a Diesel Sweeties:

http://www.dieselsweeties.com/print/strips/ds20080719.png

(Hey, it IS Comic-Con week, right?)

ravenight

07-22-2008, 12:56 PM

"But you see with the question "Is there a God?" there can only be one correct answer. There is absolutely no middle ground whatsoever. The answer is an entirely faith-based: either there is a god, or there isn't."

Dude, I can do this all night. :)

I'm yanking your chain a bit, but I'm also suggesting that people like you have just as much capacity for blind intolerance as the extremely religious.

-Tom

So what you're saying is that science is essentially a non-mystical form of religion? I agree ;)

Arguments about whether or not "reality" consists solely of "things which are empirically verifiable" are probably the most pointless possible arguments. You can't argue about what is true without first agreeing on a definition of "true". If your definition of "true" is "the bible says it", then it is clearly pointless for me to claim you need to prove it. But there's nothing that says I have to respect that opinion. A "fact" being scientifically "proven" only gives it more weight in an argument because it has been shown, again and again, to the extent that even some of the blindest die-hard zealots of other religions believe it, that when a wide consensus among scientifically-trained specialists in a field agrees that something will occur, it will occur. So the point is, there's no difference between the validity of scientific truth and religious Truth, except that scientific truth predicts the future and performs magic every god damn day, and religious truth does not.

Unfortunately, the last part of that sentence isn't something that everyone (or even a majority of people, perhaps) agrees with (though the first part is). So, some people look for ways to say that science doesn't rule out religion because they think religion can also predict the future and perform magic, and they want it to be possible because like the potential it promises them. But most importantly, they look for ways to show that science doesn't rule out religion because they know that if it did it would be right and they'd have to stop hoping for that miracle.