Chris at Cynical-C — one of my favorite blogs, BTW — has posted an essay on why he is an atheist. His main reason? The Bible:
[O]ne day in sixth grade the catholic school made a grievous error that was to change the way I thought about religion forever. They gave each of us our own bible. Up to that point, we had never had our own bible to take home and read and study. Sure, we had religion books that had parables and lessons from the bible but these were all excerpts, not actual scripture.
I had in my hand the actual word of God, the manual for everything we needed to know in life. I mean we’re talking about the Gospel, the Scripture, God’s Biography! So I read it. I read all of it from Genesis to Revelations. And what a sacred steaming pile of bullshit it was. Sure, there were some of the stories that we had learned in religion class that was familiar to me but the rest of it was boring, cruel, and just plain contradictory.
I didn’t feel blessed after reading it at all. I felt robbed more than anything. This was the basis for religion? Hell, the first story in the damn book, the story of creation, is contradicted in the very next chapter. God certainly could have used a good editor. By the time I had finished the damned Bible, I had all but lost my religion. The only reason why I didn’t lose it completely is because I didn’t know that having no religion was even an option.
My path is a bit stranger — as I read the Bible (mostly the NT), my faith in God and Jesus strengthened. Granted, that’s what I was told it would do and I was surrounded by pressure to make it happen — but happen it did. I loved the Bible. I carried it to high school with me every day, reading it during class whenever I had a chance. Every page had highlights on it, and it made me feel very spiritual.
A decade later, when I began doubting the inspiration of the Bible and had a framework for intelligent thought, I began hearing it very differently. It was no longer precious. It gradually became more and more horrific and contradictory. I saw it for what it was — an ancient text written by a multitude of men, some more barbaric than others.
And after you realize that, there’s nothing left to believe, because all the evidence for Christianity is in that book.
So in a way, the Bible was essential to my conversion and, later, essential to my unbelief.
Like Chris, my own path towards atheism began with reading the Bible. I’ve always found it rather silly that so many people could take such an obviously flawed collection of poorly written drivel so very seriously. It’s like people killing each other over a cardboard Yogi Bear kids book.
Fortunately for me, I didn’t have to read the Bible to become an atheist. Despite the fact that I was forced to go to two very different but still very fundamentalist churches simultaneously as a teen, I managed to remain fairly open minded. I spent a lot of my time when I was young asking myself the big questions and trying to reason them out, this naturally led to my disbelief. I would walk around my dad’s property and climb trees and hunt for frogs, all the while asking “where did this all come from?” If god designed us so perfectly why do so many people need glasses or braces?”
I have still not read the Bible all the way through, I don’t need to do it to make sure I’ve made the right decision. If I can rule out all gods at once why do I then need to go back and find a new reason for each specific one not to exist?
[O]ne day in sixth grade the catholic school made a grievous error that was to change the way I thought about religion forever. They gave each of us our own bible.
Guess the RCC should have kept the policy of forbidding the laity to read the Bible, just like in the Good Old Days ;-).
Something similar happened to me, where the Bible first strengthened my faith and then the opposite. I was in the middle of learning all the great reasons Jews have for rejecting Jesus, and I started looking up every verse in my concordance that supposedly was a prophecy about Jesus. None of them had anything to do with Jesus! Now that I think on it, that may have been the last time I opened my Bible looking for God.
I had the same experience – sitting down to read the Bible front to back is what really shook my faith. Many years of Catholic school education also helped – say what you will about religion, but there are some excellent Catholic schools out there (I know many people who attribute their lack of faith to taking their Catholic school education seriously). I didn’t get all the way through it, and I agree whole-heartedly with Sisyphus Fragment on not feeling any real need to.
Perhaps we could think of the Bible’s role in our lack of faith differently. The book stayed the same – we are the ones who changed, and we brought something different to the Bible at different points in our lives. ?
Good stuff.
I experienced very little religion growing up besides going to church a hand full of times with my grandparents, and then the occasional saying of grace by some family members or friends when it was time to eat.
Although I didn’t know much about religion, I always had this feeling that it wasn’t right. Because I never understood it, I was always mostly ambivalent about it, until recently.
I’ve been reading The God Delusion, and last night I watched hours of Sam Harris on YouTube. I just can’t get over how clear his way of thinking is to me. His logic is undeniable, and to hear him speak about it is so refreshing. He is the best debater I have ever seen.
I sometimes wonder if in order for me to truly be an athiest, that I should first understand more what it is to be a believer. However, while that is a good idea for most other subjects, I do not think that it is necessary in the case of religion. The reason is because always looking at anything with a view of skepticism is a good thing, especially when it comes to subjects that have no basis in fact or reason.
Of course if I hoped to convert others, or participate in debates, then knowing both sides is of utmost importance. But just for oneselve’s own satisfaction, I don’t think it is always necessary.
@Adamus
I don’t know about you, but I hold my cardboard Yogi Bear book very dear – kind of sacred.
Here’s a good Bhuddist website, howerver ;
http://www.arrowheadsangha.com/basics.html#4truths
The Bhuddists hold views not that dissimilar to many athiests. They accept the universe and world as it is and don’t try to ascribe a mystical or deitous source for it’s causes and effects.
Thiers is more the realm of the inner universe than the outer.
The sad thing about the Bible is that all of the dry, boring parts are at the beginning. Which is discouraging for someone trying to read it as a cohesive book.
The exciting parts start at the middle and end with the Proverbs, Psalms, prophets and New Testament – if your into that sort of thing and into engaging your heart (affections) in deitous pursuit.
Wouldn’t want anyone to get “God in my heart” syndrome.
Reading the Bible can also heighten your reading/thinking skills since i’ts packed tightly with words of dense meaning and concepts, though atheists think these concepts are bunk, concepts nonetheless.
Murrow, I’ve always wondered what you believe and what side you’re arguing for, I think you’ve explained it a few times but never as a whole and without lots of qualifiers…
Atheists don’t see the concepts in the bible as bunk; mass murder is obviously still very much a hot topic. We just see them as barbaric.
Personally, I grew up an atheist, but I went to religious schools and I can remember reading Revelations for fun one day (sort of skimming over it, because if you read it closely it’s kind of boring), then coming home and telling my mum “I just read Revelations. That man was insane.”
Funny … “the manual for everything we needed to know in life” and “the basis for religion”? How could anybody reasonable believe an almost-2000 year old book rewritten by mortals many times in very different languages is still the ultimate authority? These may be protestant “sola scriptura” ideas, but definitely they are not shared by other Christian traditions.
Sola scriptura (Latin ablative, “by scripture alone”) is the assertion that the Bible as God’s written word is self-authenticating, clear (perspicuous) to the rational reader, its own interpreter (“Scripture interprets Scripture”), and sufficient of itself to be the final authority of Christian doctrine.
This assertion is not supported by Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Anglican, and Oriental Orthodox Churches, which teach that the Scriptures are an important but not exclusive part of the Sacred Tradition from which the Churches derive their doctrines. These bodies also believe that the Church has authority over the Scriptures.
privet
Are you proposing that just because some sects of religion do not base their faith on the idea that the bible is 100% the word of God, and only say 20 or 30% the word of Him, that their beliefs are any more valid?
If you are, imagine this:
These sects build their views upon chosen verses and chapters of the Bible, and throw the rest away.
If the only proof we have that God (supposedly) exists is the Bible, then the rest of these sect’s beliefs and doctrines are completely fabricated by the mortal men of those churches, and automatically makes them fallible.
Fascinating, all of you.
I discovered the writings of Robert A. Heinlein when I was fourteen (the adult books–I’d already devoured his juvenile fiction). I found it horrifyingly blasphemous. I particularly remember, from The Notebooks of Lazarus Long:
.
I was also discovering sex, and the cognitive dissonance produced between adolescent hormones and a Catholic upbringing could be harnessed to power a mid-sized city.
So I bumbled through my late teens and twenties claiming I was “agnostic”. In a way, I think I still am–I mean, I’d really kind of like to believe there was a Great Manitou or something.
But that’s the point, really.
One day I realized that Zeus had once been the major deity for the Greeks, Jove for the Romans. I harked back to my school days, and a line from G.B. Shaw:
[end blockquote FAIL]
McBloggenstein:
“These sects build their views upon chosen verses and chapters of the Bible, and throw the rest away.”
No, they don’t throw anything away. They comment and explain the Bible. They just don’t interpret the texts literally – that would be silly. The same verses are explained differently by different churches – there’s no way around it, the natural language is too ambiguous, it’s not mathematics.
“If the only proof we have that God (supposedly) exists is the Bible, then the rest of these sect’s beliefs and doctrines are completely fabricated by the mortal men o those churches, and automatically makes them fallible.”
Unless you’re a protestant, no, Bible is not the only proof, that’s the point. How can God live in a book? The Holy Tradition is the key, it’s called “the life of the Holy Spirit in the Church.” Holy Tradition is the deposit of faith given by Jesus Christ to the Apostles and passed on in the Church from one generation to the next without addition, alteration or subtraction. That’s what Orthodox Christians believe, at least :)
They do take some texts literally, and some not. If you are supposing that some churches take none of it literally, then they might as well draw inspiration and lessons on life from Mark Twain.
Oh right right right……
I completely forgot that the only other proof besides the Bible is stories handed down by hundreds of generations.
A story is not proof. A tradition is not proof. Evidence is.
The fact that a lot of people celebrate christmas does not mean Santa Clause exists.
The fact that children put their teeth under their pillows at night does not mean the tooth fairy exists.
A tradition of faith that started in a time when a man named Jesus roamed around saying miraculous things, and claiming to be the son of God, does not prove that god exists.
Of course that means that the Bible does not prove that God exists as well, but at least it is a supposed written account of things said and done long ago.
McBloggenstein:
I see you feel emotional about this topic… another recovering “protestant atheist”? :)
Well, I’m not a Christian nor atheist so the proofs or existence or non-existence of God are both complete nonsense to me. And it’s irrelevant, this topic is not about existence of God, it’s about Christian dogma and Bible weirdness.
Look carefully at the original posting. It says:
(1) Bible is the only authority on Christian doctrine
(2) he suddenly found the Bible is weird (like, nobody noticed this in the previous 2000 years)
ergo
Christianity is unfounded.
I’m just pointing out (1) is not true in general, so the logic chain is broken.
It doesn’t necessarily mean Christianity is right, of course.
Oh no, always been atheist.
Sure the excerpt Daniel posted focused on Bible weirdness, but if you read C-C’s entire article, it tells why he does not believe in God.
I guess what I’m saying is, a happier life is derived from achieving balance between the older reptillian parts of our brain and the complicated blessing that is evidenced from our expanded frontal lobes.
Philosophies are a mechanism for helping to achieve this.
Balance is the key.
The Bible has helped me the most with this but mostly the teachings of Jesus and parts that speak of how to treat others, not the creation or revelation parts.
I would agree that the Bible has many barbaric and genocidal accounts in it, but there are nuggets of positive philosophy if you weed out all the irrelevant and barbaric parts.
If I had been born in another country, maybe I would feel the same way about thier dominant religion.
America itself exists as it does today because many in our Country and Government adopted this barbaric and genocidal theme from the Bible, calling it “Manifest Destiny”, justifying the genocide of the Native Americans, moving them across the country, from region to region till they were sure that the Indians were on land that had absolutely no mineral or natural resources, placing them on reservations that are barely liveable.
Our Country would look much different today if we had actually kept our word and the treaties we signed with the Indians.
I guess I’m advocating that finding balance between the lower,more primitive parts of our drives as humans, and the higher drives of compassion, peace, charity, etc. make culture and civilzation operate better. Never rule out hero worship either, even if it’s just a big brother, father or a mystical super hero.
I feel that nuggets found in the Bible and Bhuddist philosophy best address the challenges we face in western culture.
Why do we have police forces? Because at some point we decided it was unacceptable for people to act as animals, raping, robbing and killing whatever and whenever they wanted.
Religions often do not touch people where they live. They often seem ineffectual, distant and don’t really advocate balance between what we are and what we aspire to be.
Science has done away with the need for barbarism and superstition in our culture, however, there is still a need for philosophy or a code of conduct, even if it’s secular humanism, unitarianism, chaos theory, bhuddism or christianity.
Religion provides, at least, a chance, for the common man, to be exposed to some sort of philosophy, even though it gets mangled by most religions.
We can’t all afford Psyco- therapists.
A side note to this is that the American Indians revenge may be that they can set up casinos on any land that they still posess.
An example of this is near where I live in Kansas city Kansas.
The Indians had a small cemetery, not more than 1/4 block in size right in the middle of downtown Kansas City, Kansas.
The Indians moved in trailers and set up slot machines and gaming tables right in the middle of the downtown which was contrary to local and state gaming laws. A court battle ensued for 2 years between the U.S. bureau of Indian affairs, the tribe, and state officials until the state law was modified, moving the casino to the edge of town where the Indians can freely take the white mans money.
My de-conversion happened while I was trying to get closer to God, spending more time praying and reading the Bible. At first, I blamed myself for the Bible not making sense, because I must have been too carnal minded or something. Then, one day I said, “Screw this. It doesn’t make sense because it doesn’t make sense!” And that was that. I’ve been struggling to grow up ever since.