Whereas most modern researchers try to follow the evidence wherever it leads, conservative Christians (and the conservative adherents of many other religions) pursue lines of evidence only so far as this evidence does not contradict the basic beliefs mandated by their holy texts. In the case of conservative Christians, scientific research, educational research, biblical research - all of these are just fine as long as they don’t clash with the ‘foundational truths of scripture’. The ethical, but otherwise unfettered pursuit of knowledge is no longer the researcher’s point of departure. The Bible is the baseline.

Fundamentalist reasoning about subjects like evolution or biblical criticism is invariably specious at heart because it focuses on an irrelevant factor, namely the biblical baseline. Sometimes this is glaringly obvious, while at other times it’s quite well disguised.

Reading the arguments of the baseliners is quite unlike reading, say, Richard Dawkins, Peter Singer or Carl Sagan who generally attack the opposition head-on and with great rigour. Instead you’ll find enveloping clouds of non sequiturs, ad hominem positions, lots of circular reasoning, inventive insults and regurgitation of long-discredited ‘facts’, together with a final, ringing assertion that yet again, the Bible has been ‘proven true’. Conservative evangelicals’ point of departure doubles as their conclusion.

Read the full analysis of the biblical baseline: The Foolishness of God

Filed in: Biblical criticism, Fundamentalism

The evangelical Christians who run New Life magazine probably consider themselves a highly moral group of people. After all, they spend much of their time fulminating against abortion rights, gay and lesbian rights, feminists, ‘evolutionists’, supporters of voluntary euthanasia and similar miscreants. Surely they themselves are ‘right with God’.

As with a number of conservative Christian journals, you can tell a lot about the core beliefs of the publishers and editors by reading the children’s pages. Here, the organisation’s basic ideas are distilled to their essence, untrammelled by the bodyguard of … I was going to say ‘nuances’, but let’s say ‘lies’ instead … that accompany similar articles written for adult consumption.

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Filed in: Biblical criticism, Evangelicals

A Jehovah’s Witness named Angela dropped a letter in my postbox the other day, asking me to invite her around so she could give me a 16-week ‘home Bible course’. Despite the enormous spiritual benefits that would undoubtedly accrue to me, I shall have to decline this kind offer, partly owing to this assertion:

Many people who have not had the opportunity to read it are surprised at how practical and up-to-date the Bible is. Not only is it historically and scientifically accurate, but its record of fulfilled prophecies gives further reason for examination of its contents.

I wonder how Angela would feel if I asked her over and proceeded to show her that the entire Passion and Crucifixion narrative, rather than being the fulfilment of Old Testament prophecies, was inventively constructed on the basis of them. And that many of these ‘prophecies’ were wrenched from their contexts and were not really prophecies at all. In other words, that Angela’s got it all the wrong way around and that the Passion is a work (actually several works) of fiction.

I tried this once. Only to learn that it’s not nice being called a hell-bound blasphemer in your own house. So perhaps I won’t do it again.

Filed in: Biblical criticism

Many Jewish people think that the Christian Right is basically well-disposed towards them. After all, conservative Christians in both America and Australia strongly support the bulk of Israel’s foreign and domestic policies as well as providing plenty of tourist dollars.

In fact, however, most Christian fundamentalists and other conservative evangelicals foresee a brief but violent future for the Jews. When Jesus returns ’soon’, Jews will either have to convert to Christianity or die, generally in battle or through plagues and famine. There will be no Jews in Jesus’ millennial kingdom.

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Filed in: Biblical criticism, Christian Right, People

Terry Lane, a Melbourne religious and political affairs commentator, recently wrote a brief article about the biblical attitude to homosexuals (’Better to run away than burn in hell’, Melbourne Sunday Age, 2 Jul. 2006).

Lane began by quoting Paul’s letter to the Romans:

God gave them up to dishonourable passions. (Er. God made them do it? - T.L.) Their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural, and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another … [T]hose who do such things deserve to die …

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Filed in: Biblical criticism, Sexuality

I was surprised to read such ill-informed comments at the end of Scott Murray’s review of ‘The Passion of the Christ’ … One could refer him to Josephus and Tacitus (Jewish and Roman historians of the time that Jesus lived) among others and he might find that there is more historical evidence for Jesus having lived than Julius Caesar. Reviewers should find out their facts before moving out of the realm of just commenting on the movie production.

Mignon Goswell, Box Hill North (Melbourne Age Green Guide, 20 Apr. 2006)

I suppose I read a letter like this in the media every month or so. I used to grind my teeth and churn out two-page replies that rarely made it into print. When I finally grasped the principle that responses should be very concise - certainly no longer than the initial letter - I found myself with other concerns. In particular, I began to undervalue the significance of always challenging ignorant viewpoints like this one. Goswell’s argument is riddled with flaws and we owe it to the public to point these out, briefly but clearly.

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Filed in: Biblical criticism

The Archbishop of Canterbury is not a big fan of The Da Vinci Code:

In a strongly worded Easter sermon, Dr Rowan Williams said there was a tendency to treat biblical texts ‘as if they were unconvincing press releases from some official source, whose intention is to conceal the real story’. (Melbourne Age, 17 Apr. 2006)

In fact, Rowan, that’s a very sensible way in which to treat all biblical texts. As Bible scholar Bart Ehrman (2005) points out:

Not only do we not have the original [biblical texts], we don’t have the first copies of the originals … What we have are copies made later - much later. In most instances, they are copies made many centuries later. And these copies all differ from one another, in many thousands of places … [T]here are more differences among our manuscripts than there are words in the New Testament. (Misquoting Jesus, 10)

Pace Archbishop Williams, the ‘real story’ has certainly been concealed from us to some extent, although whether intentionally or unintentionally is often impossible to tell. As Ehrman concludes:

If one wants to insist that God inspired the very words of scripture, what would be the point if we don’t have the very words of scripture? … It’s a bit hard to know what the words of the Bible mean if we don’t even know what the words are! (ibid., 11)

Filed in: Biblical criticism

For a religion that supposedly aims to bring peace and harmony to the world, Christianity does a lousy job. Christians have been at each other’s throats for 2,000 years - Arians vs Athanasians, Trinitarians vs Unitarians, Calvinists vs Arminians, Catholics vs Protestants, the list goes on and on. Today’s battle is essentially between conservatives (fundamentalists, Pentecostals and the like) and liberals, but if they ever manage to patch this one up there’s bound to be something else.

The meaning of just about every verse in the Bible has been ferociously disputed by various Christian factions, often with lethal results for some of the contestants and many innocent bystanders who just happened to get in the way. Think Inquisition, witch-burnings, civil wars and the decimation of native populations in the name of ’spreading true Christianity’. There’s a strong argument - I think an overwhelming one - that Christianity cannot possibly be ‘the one true religion’ as its teachings and central principles are so contradictory and utterly imprecise. Christians cannot even decide what the commandment ‘Thou shalt not kill’ actually means. If you don’t believe this, just ask a conservative Christian and a liberal Christian and then compare their answers.

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Filed in: Biblical criticism, Evangelicals

[Professor Werther] fails to recognise … that there is a historical content to the Christian faith, not just blind belief.
Emeritus Professor Allan J. Day, Melbourne Age, 11 Aug. 2005

Day made this comment in his contribution to a recent public debate about so-called ‘Intelligent Design’ theory. Many Christians make a similar assertion i.e. that, unlike most other religions, Christianity has a firm historical basis, with an implication that its claims are therefore entitled to special respect. But what exactly do people such as Professor Day mean by terms like ‘historical content’ and ‘historical basis’?

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Filed in: Biblical criticism

Is the Bible a historically accurate document? Most people would probably give it at least some credence: ‘Well, there was Moses and Abraham and so on, and Israel and Babylon, and of course Jesus …’

Confining ourselves to the Old Testament (OT) for the moment, would you be surprised to learn that many scholars feel that it’s almost impossible to derive any firm historical information from this source at all? And that it consists of little more than pious fiction?

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Filed in: Biblical criticism, Creationism