March 26, 2021

March 26, 2021 By

Atheist author and polemicist John W. Loftus wrote an article entitled, “Dr. David Madison, Debunker Par Excellence!” (3-25-21). His words will be in blue.

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I’m a big fan of former Methodist minister and biblical scholar Dr. David Madison, who no longer believes. He understands how best to debunk Christianity.

Really? I never noticed that. I have refuted his attacks on the Bible and Christianity now 44 times (without a peep in reply) and, frankly, it was always very easy to refute his nonsense: so weak and poor was the argumentation.

Madison expertly presents a cumulative case against Christianity, which is the best way to compel childlike believers to abandon their make-believe fantasies.

And I systematically present a cumulative case against his anti-biblical and anti-Christian fantasies and relentless excursions into myth and illogic. Real thinkers will prefer to read both sides of an argument, rather than just one. Let the best man win! On my blog, I cite tons of the words of my dialogue opponents, so readers can get their views directly, rather than from an opponent biased against them.

Everyone interested in investigating and analyzing the complete undeniable palpable falseness of Christianity should be reading Madison– and everyone should be interested! However, as Madison acknowledges, Christians “assuredly have a long history of not paying attention.” (p. 29) “Even if they’re not oblivious, they are just not interested.” 

Ah, I see. So it’s us Christians who are massively guilty of not reading critical atheist commentary; indeed, running from it. It’s true that many act in this way. Only so many hours in a day . . . But this is absurdly ironic, coming from the guy who has not the slightest interest in any critique of his own work, and from Loftus, who acts in exactly the same way regarding his anti-Christian polemics, too. Loftus expressly challenged me to read his book, Why I Became an Atheist and offer critiques of it. I did so and responded with ten critiques: all utterly ignored by Loftus.

After I had completed 34 of my 44 critiques of David Madison’s polemics, Loftus felt compelled to chime in at his blog, and wrote:

The Rules of Engagement At DC

By John W. Loftus at 8/28/2019
Some angry Catholic apologist has been tagging our posts with his angry long-winded responses. I know of no other blog, Christian or atheist, that allows for arguments by links, especially to plug one’s failing blog or site. I’ve allowed it for about a month with this guy but no more. He’s not banned. He can still come here to comment. It’s just that we don’t allow responses in the comments longer than the blog post itself, or near that. If any respectful person has a counter-argument or some counter-evidence then bring it. State your case in as few words as possible and then engage our commenters in a discussion. But arguments by links or long comments are disallowed. I talked with David Madison who has been the target of these links and he’s in agreement with this decision. He’s planning to write something about one or more of these links in the near future. [he never did: almost needless to say]

See my extensive reply to this. Recently, I was indeed banned from Debunking Christianity, for the supposed reason of being “obnoxious” (so I saw Loftus comment on another atheist blog). “Obnoxious” is cowardly atheist code for “anyone who dares to 1) confront atheist arguments, and actually 2) refute them. That’s “obnoxious”. That’s being an uppity Christian, and it will not be tolerated by the supremely confident, unvanquishable intellectual titans Loftus or Madison. Such atheists have no interest whatsoever in critique of their charges, because that goes against the illusion of invincibility, you see. They do all they can to ignore such counter-arguments and pretend that they don’t exist. It’s bad for business to not do that.

He notes there are probably no atheist books on a shelf labeled “Our Atheist Critics” in Christian bookstores. 

I have scores and scores of articles dealing with atheist criticism of Christianity on my Atheism web page. There are many books that address so-called “Bible contradictions” from a Christian perspective. These are largely brought up by either atheists or theologically liberal Christians who no longer believe in the inspiration of the Bible. The most famous one is Gleason Archer’s New International Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties. Recently, I compiled in one place my own many refutations of alleged biblical contradictions. So at least some of us deal with “our atheist critics”: who in turn, ignore these efforts.

Still it’s my hope to introduce Christians and others to Madison, an ordained Methodist minister who became an atheist. They should listen to those of us who have left the Christian fold and found the intellectual freedom to follow the evidence wherever it leads, rather than remaining zombies who just quote-mine from the Bible and the diverse theologies developed from it. What did we learn on the way to heaven that caused us to walk away from any hope of seeing our loved ones again after we die? Surely Christians should want to read one story or two, along with the arguments that convinced us to leave the fold of our upbringing. Surely!

Yes, we should definitely do so, alongside replies to this bilge, such as my own. It will strengthen the faith of any Christian to see how abysmally weak arguments like Madison’s and Loftus’ and those of many other anti-theist atheists are. I write replies to atheist deconversion stories, also, to demonstrate how their reasons for leaving Christianity don’t hold up under logical or factual scrutiny, either. When I did this with Loftus’ deconversion story (a shorter article about it), he blew a gasket and after a very short time could only reply with “you’re an idiot!” and suchlike.

You get the idea. Really intellectual and objective stuff . . . And the reactions to critiques of atheist deconversion stories are always basically the same (I know, having written 30 or so of them): how dare any Christian closely examine atheist reasons for apostasy (i.e., regarding atheists who were formerly Christians). Anger and fury almost immediately surface; and the “fangs” come out (Loftus being the absolute worst case I myself have observed; he had skin so thin even an electron microscope couldn’t detect it). But hey: it’s all fair game. They go after our beliefs and the Bible; we in turn scrutinize their supposedly compelling reasons for unbelief and apostasy.

[after noting Madison’s degrees and languages that he speaks] . . . don’t tell me he’s ignorant. That option isn’t available to you.

Nonsense. He’s certainly ignorant about 1) what the Bible actually teaches, and 2) how to properly interpret the Bible. He is also terrible at logic. I repeatedly demonstrate these things, and there is a good reason why he utterly ignores all that. It exposes him.

It’s David Madison against all the Christian apologetics in the world down through the centuries, and my bet is on him, hands down, no iffs [sic] ands or buts about it. 

Yeah, he’s so superior to all of our combined efforts that he can’t bring himself to tackle even one of my 44 critiques. That’s surely and undoubtedly pure superiority and supreme intellectual confidence. I’ve never seen a clearer example of it!

So it’s no surprise that some atheists are looking down on people who debunk religion when compared to others who are trying to build a better atheist, humanist or secular society. We’re told the latter are doing the harder work, the necessary work and the more important work. Madison disagrees, as I do.

Yeah, me too. I say: do this all you like. It shows again and again (when apologists and others refute them) how exceedingly weak, miserable, inadequate, illogical, and pathetic the atheist anti-biblical arguments are. So this provides a service to the Christian community, insofar as they manage to read the critiques such as my own: that anti-theists do all they can to obscure and make sure that atheists never know of their existence: lest their own lies be exposed for what they are.

I have argued for a test to help believers examine their own faith fairly and honestly, seen in my book The Outsider Test for Faith.

I refuted this argument of his in September 2007 and again in September 2019: to stony silence and crickets each time.

I think his book and writings are doing what needs to be done to disabuse Christians of their faith. We cannot have a piecemeal approach to debunking Christianity, debunking one belief or doctrine at a time. We must assault Christianity as a whole with a cumulative case. Nothing else will do, even if it means we cannot be experts in every area we write about.

And Christian apologists must defeat and demolish these efforts. I try my best to do just that.

He Doesn’t Care That Much If Christian Intellectuals Take Notice. No doubt Madison would like it if they did, but he doesn’t really care since he’s dealing with deluded people, all of them in some measure. So it doesn’t matter what university they graduated from or how many degrees they earned. He doesn’t need their validation as a credential to be proud about. They’re all deluded. Why should we care about their intellectuals (or better, obfucationists [sic] ) so long as we’re reaching people?

Ah, exactly! This at least explains (along with sheer cowardice) why he ignores me. It goes against the plan: as I noted above. As long as Madison can fool and hoodwink people, then it’s in his interest to make sure that his rabid followers never see any replies to his bilge. By contrast, a true thinker welcomes critiques of his or her work; relishes the challenge to either clarify or retract, as they case may be. That’s how actual intellectuals (true to the essence of the category) function. But I am thankful for this transparent (and rare) exposition of how atheist anti-theist polemicists like Madison, Loftus, and many others actually go about their business, minus intellectual integrity.

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Photo credit: cover of John Loftus’ 2012 book from its Amazon page.
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Summary: I critique the hypocrisy- & irony-filled analysis of atheist John Loftus regarding the work of his colleague David Madison. Both men ignore critiques & relentlessly display “atheist cowardice.”
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February 13, 2021

February 13, 2021 By

I recently observed:

Our beloved atheist critics are constantly informing us lowly, ignorant Christians that atheism itself is, alas, not a formulated position, but only the absence of a position (belief in God). It’s not a worldview, etc. I wish I had a dime for every time I’ve heard that. It’s not true, but we hear it all the time. (2-2-21)

Lo and behold, on the very next day, Dr. Richard C. Miller, put up on the notorious Debunking Christianity website (which just banned me again for merely noting that I had refuted one of the big shots there: Dr. David Madison, 44 times, with no reply back) the article, The “Atheist” Misnomer. We shall examine his arguments. His words will be in blue.

Atheist. Let us problematize the term just for a moment, shall we? In classical Greek etymology, the alpha prefix denoted sheer negation, precisely equivalent to the Latin “non.” “Theos,” of course, meant “deity” or “god,” and the Greek suffix “-ismos” became applied in Latin and, as such, pulled up into early English, conveying “adherence toward” or “belief in.” So, an atheist is one who is not a theist, that is, one who does not hold a belief in the existence of any deity.

No one doubts that that is the literal meaning of the word. It doesn’t follow, however, that the atheist believes nothing in a positive sense, or that he or she possesses no worldview or sets of beliefs. They certainly do (as virtually all sentient human beings do, whether they acknowledge it or not). Someone wisely said: “the most dangerous philosophy is the unacknowledged one.”

We often find in the false rhetoric of Christian apologists and of Christian pseudo-intellectuals the claim that atheism is itself a belief.

Technically, “non-belief in God” is not a belief, but a rejection of another; I (and we) agree. However (and it’s a huge “however”), atheists do highly tend to hold to certain beliefs, whether they will acknowledge them or not. And these beliefs do in fact add up to a particular worldview held by the vast majority of atheists. Briefly put, most of them are philosophical materialists, empiricists, positivists, methodological naturalists, enraptured with science as supposedly the sole valid epistemology: making it essentially their religion (“scientism”): all of which are objectively identifiable positions, that can be discussed and either embraced or dismissed.

So it’s not so much that we are saying that there is an “atheist worldview” per se. Rather, we make the observation (from long personal experience, if one is an apologist like myself) that every self-described “atheist” will overwhelmingly tend to possess a particular worldview (whatever they call it or don’t call it) that is an amalgam of many specific, identifiable things that themselves are worldviews or philosophies or ways of life.

Whatever one thinks of the above analysis, it remains the case that atheists call themselves atheists, and that it is highly likely that they will hold to one or more the (usually clustered) belief-systems outlined above. And they will often be blind to the fact that they are doing so, and will talk in terms of their simply following “science” and/or “reason” (with the implication that the non-atheist usually does not do either or is fundamentally irrational or “naive” or “gullible” simply because they reject atheism). Dr. Miller reflects this annoying and condescending attitude as well, when he writes:

We may as well call ourselves the adrogonists or the alephrechaunists, inasmuch as the very identity “atheist” tacitly legitimates the patently ridiculous, as though a genuine rational debate exists between two opposing sides. To carry on with non-belief in fairies, leprechauns, ghouls, gods, angels, genies, or phantoms is merely to be reasonable, not to stake a position in any legitimate debate to be waged in society. The moon is not made of green cheese, and the dismissal of such a “Mother-Goose” characterization of reality does not earn one the tag “a-green-cheese-moonist,” but merely one who is “reasonable.” 

For, belief in mythology is and always has been a conscious, willful indulgence, not a compelling, evidence-driven conclusion; the latter we instead properly term “knowledge.” So, when it comes to the matter of deities, in a more honest world we “atheists” instead would be known merely as the reasonable (in the most literal sense of the term), that is, those compelled by a mental construction of reality determined rather exclusively by evidence and reason.

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I cannot count how many times and contexts I have come across this ridiculous claim, a claim akin to smokers alleging that non-smokers are also themselves smokers.. Ummm.. huh? No. By very fundamental definition, atheism entails no belief. Indeed, the term affirms nothing other than the negation. By comparison, in the phrase “The man is not a bingo player,” we affirm nothing about the man, except what he is not!

Again, the word does this, but I’m not discussing a mere word; I’m talking about what atheists do in fact believe, and asserting that atheists hold to beliefs and belief-systems (usually quite predictable ones at that). In other words: atheists are just as likely to hold worldviews as anyone else.

In like fashion, the appellation “atheist” stamped upon us has served as a rhetorical misnomer, the binary recessive determined by exclusion vis-a-vis the dominant group, to follow the parlance of Jacques Derrida. Where else do people play such a game with language? Atheism is a non-group, a namespace only by negation.

This is downright comical; as if atheists don’t massively choose to call themselves this name? They could reject it if they like. They’re free to do so. No one is forcing them at gunpoint to use this name for themselves. They could use “agnostic” (and many do, but it is a less certain and less dogmatic outlook), or they could use a word like “humanist” (which a number of them also do). But the fact remains that lots and lots of atheists show no reversion to the term atheist. Quite the contrary, they proudly embrace it.

For heaven’s sake, on the very website where this essay was published, if one looks at the top, we see John Loftus’ books in a photograph: one of which is Why I Became an Atheist (which I have critiqued ten times: with total silence back from Jittery John: he of explosive disposition on the few occasions where we actually interacted).

One can peruse book titles with “atheism” in them at Amazon. The late Christopher Hitchens (a very famous and influential atheist indeed) edited a book entitled, The Portable Atheist: Essential Readings for the Nonbeliever. Loudmouthed anti-theist atheist Dan Barker authored the modestly titled volume, Godless: How an Evangelical Preacher Became One of America’s Leading Atheists. I could note a guy like “DagoodS” whom I have met in person and have debated many times. He used to be very active also at Debunking Christianity. He exhibits no aversion to the term “atheist” at all, and write a post there called “Why is an atheist an atheist?” (1-11-07), in which he opined:

But ask an atheist why they are an atheist, and most times the person is so ready to respond to why the atheist is incorrect in her reply; they literally cannot wait for the poor person to stop talking. . . .

But get into this field, and I have people everywhere almost giddy with the joy of informing me why I am an atheist, regardless of what I say. Yes, sirree! . . .

You want to know why an atheist is an atheist. Ask him. . . .

See, people become atheists for as many and varied reasons as people do just about anything else. Yes, some do because of an emotional reaction. Some are born in atheist homes.

One could easily go on and on, with scores of further examples, but it quickly becomes ridiculous and an insult to everyone’s intelligence.

In conclusion, here are some of the many things that atheists en masse believe:

1) that matter exists.
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2) that he or she exists.
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3) that matter can be observed according to more or less predictable scientific laws (uniformitarianism).
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4) that we can trust our senses to analyze such observations and what they mean (empiricism).
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5) in the correctness of mathematics, which starts from axioms as well.
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6) in the laws of logic, in order to even communicate (not to mention argue) anything with any meaning at all.
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7) in presupposing that certain things are absolutely true.
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8) that matter has the inherent “God-like” / in effect “omnipotent” capability of organizing itself, evolving, inexorably developing into all that we observe in the entire universe. There is no God or even any sort of immaterial spirit that did or could do this, so it has to fall back onto matter. The belief in this without any reason whatsoever to do so is what I have written at length about as the de facto religion of “atomism.”
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9) that the universe began in a Big Bang (for who knows what reason).
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10) that the universe created itself out of nothing (for who knows what reason), but it’s deemed more rational than the Christian believing that God is an eternal spirit, Who created the universe.

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11) that science is the only method by which we can objectively determine facts and truth (extreme empiricism + scientism).
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I’m sure I could come up with many more things if I sat and thought about it a while, but this is more than sufficient to demonstrate my point: atheists (as people) have worldviews, even though the word atheism itself merely means “rejecting a belief in God.”

And that’s what we lowly, despised apologists are saying. If it’s disagreed with, then I’m more than happy to interact and defend this paper. Have at it!

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Photo credit: geralt  (1-23-21) [Pixabay / Pixabay License]
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January 19, 2021

January 19, 2021 By

Atheist author and polemicist John W. Loftus wrote an article entitled, “The Evidential Value of Conversion/Deconversion Stories. Reviewing Mittelberg’s “Confident Christianity” Part 7″ (2-22-18). I will be responding to his arguments regarding atheist deconversion stories (which tell of how and why one left the Christian faith). His words will be in blue.

*****

I want to digress a bit for this post to discuss the value of personal conversion/deconversion stories. [Nomenclature: A conversion story is one which an atheist or nonbeliever becomes a Christian. A deconversion story is one in which a Christian becomes a non-believer or atheist.] . . . 

Mittelberg never tells any Christian-to-atheist deconversion stories. He just tells atheist-to-Christian conversion stories (plus Antony Flew’s story). Should we fault him for not telling any deconversion stories? Yes, I think so! For it means he’s not offering readers any evidence to consider, but rather trying to persuade them to believe based on the conclusions others reached. His faulty line of reasoning goes this: since atheist person X became a Christian, you should too. Why should that matter? He had asked readers to follow the evidence for themselves. But by putting forth several stories of skeptic/atheist conversions to Christianity he’s not actually presenting any objective evidence for the readers to consider. Instead, he’s presenting the conclusions of others about the evidence, which is arguing by authority, the very thing he questions later. He had also asked readers to follow logic. But by adopting the conclusion of others just because they adopted it is not logical. Why not just present the evidence? The stories are a propaganda technique designed purposefully to persuade.

In any case, if Mittelberg considers atheist-to-Christian conversion stories as some kind of evidence, he needs to share a few Christian-to-atheist deconversion stories, or else, explain why the later deconversion stories have very little, or no evidential weight to them! If he’s honest that is. If nothing else, he should provide an Endnote acknowledging this additional issue with a reference for readers to look up. But then, who said apologetics was an honest enterprise? Not me. Not from what I see.

This is absolutely fascinating. I say that specifically because I have my own history of interaction with John Loftus, and of dealing with many atheists, whose deconversion stories I have critiqued. I’ve done quite a few of these through the years (including John’s). One can check out the section “Atheist ‘Deconversions'” on my Atheism web page, plus other critiques of atheists to whom I’ve devoted sections on that page.

I can testify (no pun intended!) that absolutely nothing makes an atheist (at least of the anti-theist variety) more angry than having some Christian critique their deconversion. They especially hate and despise any insinuation at all that they may have left Christianity out of ignorance and false premises, rather than the claimed massive increase in knowledge and rationality.

Anthony Toohey is one of the few atheists who has ever troubled himself to reply back to one of my critiques (twice; I link to his second counter-reply). And of course, he is very personally hostile (the virtually universal response to my critiques). First, he refers to me as “simply a self-educated Catholic schlemiel with a blog,” then pours out the inevitable avalanche of personal insults:

Dave is just being the aforementioned jerk . . . habit of inserting the worst assumptions into every gap he can find rather than make an honest attempt . . .  offensive and puerile tactics of belittling the writer because of what he imagines in the spaces rather than respond to what he actually reads in the words . . . Dave’s dishonesty . . .

Then he concludes:

The main takeaway is that Dave is reading a deconversion story, and is mystified that in 2,701 words he can’t find a book full of arguments as to why Christianity is not to be believed. And he trashes John [Loftus] for it. John calls him stupid. I don’t think he’s far from the mark there, if we’re being honest. John’s challenge is for Dave to put his money where his mouth is and actually read the damn book. Dave won’t.

Believe me, this is absolutely typical of responses to critiques such as those I have offered. Most won’t write an entire counter-response, but there will be snipes in comboxes, and then feeding frenzies, where a bunch of atheists decide to go on the attack and anything goes. Note, however, how Anthony claims that I supposedly “won’t” read John Loftus’ book about his deconversion. Therein lies a tale, and is the main focus of this paper.

I first critiqued one online version of Loftus’ deconversion way back on 10-15-06. This is how Loftus responded:

You are an idiot! You never critiqued my whole deconversion story. Deconversion stories are piecemeal. They cannot give a full explanation for why someone left the faith. They only give hints at why they left the faith. It requires writing a whole book about why someone left the faith to understand why they did, and few people do that. I did. If you truly want to critique my deconversion story then critique my book. Other than that, you can critique a few brief paragraphs or a brief testimony, if you want to, but that says very little about why someone left the faith. You walk away thinking you have completely analysed someone’s story. But from where I sit, that’s just stupid. That’s S-T-U-P-I-D! If you truly want to critique a deconversion story, then critique mine in my book. I wrote a complete story there.

Dave, I can only tolerate stupidity so long.

I challenge you to really critique the one deconversion story that has been published in a book. It’s a complete story. A whole story. It’s mine.

Do you accept my challenge?

At the time I declined. Here is an abridged version of my explanation why:

1) First of all, why would you even want to have your book critiqued by someone whom you routinely call an “idiot,” an “arrogant idiot,” a “joke,” a “know-it-all,” and so forth? I’ve never understood this.

2) It is a hyper-ludicrous implication to maintain that deconversion stories are immune to all criticism simply because they are not exhaustive. It’s embarrassing to even have to point this out, but there it is.

3) I have already long since taken up your “challenge.” I said many weeks ago that if you sent me your book in an e-file for free, I’d be more than happy to critique it. I won’t buy it, and I refuse to type long portions of it when it is possible to cut-and-paste. That is an important factor since my methodology is Socratic and point-by-point. I actually try to comprehensively answer opposing arguments, not just talk about them or do a mutual monologue. You railed against that, saying that it was a “handout.” I responded that you could have any of my (14 completed) books in e-book form for free.

4) One wonders, however, with your manifest “gnashing teeth” attitude towards me, what would be accomplished by such a critique? You’ve already shown that you can’t or won’t offer any rational counter-reply when I analyze any of your arguments. 

Loftus, around this time, made a challenge to a Protestant who had critiqued his shorter deconversion story:

Again, are you going to read it [his book, Why I Am an Atheist] and critique it for yourself? Hey, I dare you! I bet you think you’re that smart, don’t ya, or that your faith is that strong – that you can read something like my book and not have it affect your faith.

If Christianity is true, then you have nothing to fear. But if Christianity is false, then you owe it to yourself to get the book. Either way you win.

And even if you blast my book after reading it here on this Blog, I’ll know that you read it, and just like poison takes time to work, all I have to do from then on is to wait for a personal crisis to kill your faith.

Want to give it a go? The way I see you reason here makes me think it’ll make your head spin with so many unanswerable questions that you won’t know what to do.

But that’s just me. I couldn’t answer these questions, so if you can, you’re a smarter man than I am, and that could well be. Are you? I think not, but that’s just me.

Yet one of Loftus’ droning complaints about me is that I am way too confident! I never claimed that someone would inevitably become a Christian or a Catholic Christian upon reading any of my books or many online papers! Then he sent his potshots my way again:

You’re a joke. I’m surprised you have an audience. . . . To think you could pompously proclaim you are better than me is beyond me when you don’t know me. It’s a defensive mechanism you have with people like me. . . . It’s called respecting people as people, and Dave’s Christianity does not do that with people who don’t agree with him. . . . I’m just tired of pompous asses on the internet who go around claiming they are superior to me in terms of intelligence and faith. Such arrogance makes me vomit. . . . self-assured arrogant idiots out there, like Dave, who prefer to proclaim off of my personal experience that they are better than I. (all on 10-16-06)

Six weeks later (11-30-06) he railed against me again:

You are ignorant

you present your uninformed arguments as if everyone should agree with you

Any educated person would not state the things you do with such arrogance.

with you there is no discussion to be had for any topic you write about.

You are the answer man. Everyone else is ignoring the obvious. And that’s the hallmark of an ignorant and uneducated man.

I am annoyed by people like you, . . . pompous self-righteous know-it-all’s

Now you are attempting to defend the arrogant way you argue.

You’re just right about everything, or, at least you always come across that way.

you are an uneducated, ignorant, arrogant know-it-all.

So, anyway, this is how John Loftus: the Great Unvanquishable Christianity-Killer and Self-Proclaimed Very Important Atheist Author replied in this fashion to my critique of his story. Does that strike anyone as confident and assured that he was on the right side of the debate and had the better arguments? Yeah, that was my impression, too.

It was in June 2019 that Loftus friend Anthony Toohey confidently proclaimed that I “won’t” touch Loftus’s book, Why I Became An Atheist (the implication being, of course, that was scared and/or unable to do so). I explained why I didn’t. The main reason was that Loftus refused to send me a free PDF copy of the book, so I could deal with it point-by-point without having to type War and Peace.

But I changed my mind on 9-1-19, writing on Facebook:

I Will be Doing an In-Depth Series of Replies to Atheist John Loftus’ Self-Described “Magnum Opus,” “Why I Became an Atheist.”
I’ve been asking Loftus since 2006 [13 years!] to send me an ebook of his for free to review (while offering him any number of my books for free). He has always refused. I didn’t want to spend any money to buy one.
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I did a critique of one online version of his deconversion story in 2006. He kept insisting that to properly do such a critique, I had to order his book, where it appeared in its fullness.
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Lately, he has again acted like such an insufferable, pompous ass, as he has towards me these past 13 years (most recently censoring even bare links of mine to my replies to material on his website), that I decided tonight to purchase this book (revised version).
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I got it for $7.52 on Amazon, including shipping, for a used / very good condition copy. That won’t put me out. He’s been challenging and insulting me, so very well: I shall now devote my energies to replying to this book.
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If he is so momentously famous and important as he modestly claims he is, then my replies should get a ton of attention. That would be fine for my purposes, but as always, I’m not in this for the money. I’m simply providing rational replies to objections to Christianity. Whoever reads them, reads them. That’s not up to me. It’s not my concern. My job is to do the best job I can do, according to my capabilities.
Stay tuned!
I then set to work on my rebuttal, over the next ten days. Here it is, in ten installments:
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So of course, Loftus (full of vim and vigor and supremely confident of his beliefs) would certainly respond to such a vigorous critique, right?: since, after all, he had challenged me and others to do this very thing, and since he had written about a year-and-a-half earlier, regarding another Christian apologist:
[H]e needs to share a few Christian-to-atheist deconversion stories, or else, explain why the later deconversion stories have very little, or no evidential weight to them! If he’s honest that is. If nothing else, he should provide an Endnote acknowledging this additional issue with a reference for readers to look up. But then, who said apologetics was an honest enterprise? Not me.
Alrightey! So he made an honest man of me, and I have attained to the sublime levels of honesty and self-confidence that Jittery John Loftus has attained. So he will certainly defend himself now, right? Wrong! Here it is a year and four months later and I still haven’t heard a peep back from him. He’ still running and insulting, as always with me (these past 13 years). On 1-6-21 on his blog, he wrote about me: “I’ve had dealings with him. He’s obnoxious to the core whether it’s here or on his site. He’s unworthy of our time.” That’s anti-theist atheist-speak for “Man, I don’t know how to rationally overthrow his arguments so I better come up with a personal insult quick and pretend that that my critic’s profound ignorance and jerkhood is why I don’t reply!”
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Meanwhile, over the past two years and a few months I’ve also been systematically refuting his associate, Dr. David Madison, a former Methodist pastor who is the dominant writer on Loftus’ blog, Debunking Christianity. He’s been refuted no less than 44 times, with not a single word in reply. Instead, he issued the following jeremiad against me on 9-6-19 (not naming me, but it was clear who he meant, after 35 of my critiques):
This is a time of distress for Christian apologists. These are the die-hards who brag that they are devotees—in a professional capacity, no less—of the ancient Jesus mystery cult. They feel compelled to defend it at whatever cost. But times are changing, and they face challenges unknown to earlier apologists. . . .
So the burden of the apologist has become heavy indeed, and some don’t handle the anguish well. They vent and rage at critics, like toddlers throwing tantrums when a threadbare security blanket gets tossed out. We can smell their panic. Engaging with the ranters serves no purpose—any more than it does to engage with Flat-Earthers, Chemtrail conspiracy theorists, and those who argue that the moon landings were faked.
The five stages of Bible grief provide opportunities to initiate dialogue. I prefer to engage with NON-obsessive-compulsive-hysterical Christians, those who have spotted rubbish in the Bible, and might already have one foot out the door.
So once again, his comrade isn’t following Loftus’ advice, either. Why should he, since Loftus himself doesn’t? The game is to act all confident and triumphant and to challenge some of those ignorant Christians out there to take up the challenge of the deconversion story or the Bible-bashing obsession of a man like Dr. Madison. When someone takes up the challenge, both of ’em do absolutely everything they can to avoid any interaction.
Ten days earlier, on 8-28-19, Loftus himself had changed the rules of engagement for his forum, so as to deal with the huge “crisis” that my actually taking up his own challenge posed:
Some angry Catholic apologist has been tagging our posts with his angry long-winded responses. I know of no other blog, Christian or atheist, that allows for arguments by links, especially to plug one’s failing blog or site. I’ve allowed it for about a month with this guy but no more. He’s not banned. He can still come here to comment. It’s just that we don’t allow responses in the comments longer than the blog post itself, or near that. If any respectful person has a counter-argument or some counter-evidence then bring it. State your case in as few words as possible and then engage our commenters in a discussion. But arguments by links or long comments are disallowed. I talked with David Madison who has been the target of these links and he’s in agreement with this decision. He’s planning to write something about one or more of these links in the near future [he has yet to do so, now almost 17 months later]. So here’s how our readers can help. I’ve deleted a few of these arguments by link. There are others I’ve missed. If you see some apologist arguing by link flag it. Then I’ll be alerted where it is to delete it. What’s curious to me are the current posts he’s neglecting, like this one on horrific suffering. If he tackles that one I’ll allow him a link back.
Can’t be too careful if you get a Christian who is actually refuting your arguments! He must be silenced and mocked and dismissed in whatever way it takes: insults, ignoring, feeding frenzies in echo chamber comboxes, removing links informing your readers that he has refuted your right-hand man now for the 35th time . . .
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This is how Loftus and his anti-theist buddy Dr. David Madison actually act! So in light of this revealing background information, let’s get back to Loftus’ post that I was addressing at the top:
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What are these conversion stories evidence for? That people change their minds. We already knew this. But it’s worse than that. For as soon as Mittelberg uses conversion stories to bolster his case, it means he has to allow atheists to use their own deconversion stories to persuade people. When he does, it will provoke a debate over which side has the advantage, and Mittelberg will lose the advantage. All by themselves then, the fact that people change their minds provides no evidential weight in and of itself. But upon considering all other relevant things, ex-Christian deconversion stories have the evidential advantage.
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Yeah, that’s obviously the case, ain’t it, which must be the reason why Loftus has ignored ten critiques of his book-length deconversion, why his loudmouthed associate David Madison has ignored 44 rebuttals of his relentless Bible-bashing, and why fellow anti-theist atheist Bob Seidensticker (who directly challenged me to take up the burden of answering his charges) has now absolutely ignored no less than a remarkable 69 critiques of mine.
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Who could fail to be impressed by this confident performance?: three of the most vocal and influential atheists online have now ignored a total of 123 of my critiques!
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There are many Christian-turned-atheist deconversion stories, like those of authors Dan Barker, Hector Avalos, David Madison, David Chumney, Bart Ehrman, Valerie Tarico, Robert Price, Richard C. Miller, Marlene Winell, Edwin Suominen, Joe E. Holman, Stephen Uhl, William Lobdell, Jason Long, Charles Templeton, Kenneth Daniels, Bruce Gerencser, and myself to name a few off the top of my head (apologies to the many others I failed to mention).
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Perhaps Mr. John “You’re an idiot!” Loftus can be kind enough to let me know which of these will 1) not become furious if I critique their story, and 2) will actually respond and be willing to engage in written debate? I did critique Joe E. Holman’s story, right before I critiqued Loftus’ own, in October 2006.
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To highlight one of the less conspicuous deconversions is Dustin Lawson, a former protege of Christian apologist Josh McDowell. McDowell goes around to churches telling them to try to disprove Christianity. Well, Dustin listened to him and followed his advice! Guess what happened? ;-) Here’s a picture of us together, the apostates that apologists William Lane Craig and Josh McDowell would like to forget!
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Thanks for the recommendation. I’ll have to seek out this guy and see if he has more intellectual courage than Loftus, Madison, Seidensticker et al.
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Loftus then provides links to three sites that specialize in posting deconversion stories. I have bookmarked them and will be sure to check them out after the kind encouragement of Jittery John. Certainly, all these confident, oh-so-smart and superior atheists will warmly welcome any such challenge to their stories from a lowly Christian ignoramus like me, right?
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Our stories are not just personal feel good stuffs. We have the arguments too.
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Yeah, they have arguments all right. It’s just that they are terribly weak and I’ve never had any trouble exposing them for how fallacious, fact-challenged, and unconvincing they are. One is never more convinced of Christianity than after one sees how very flimsy and insubstantial the opposing arguments are, and how misinformed so many ex-Christians were of their faith (including Loftus himself) before they made the fateful decision to leave Christianity.
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Photo credit: cover of John Loftus’ 2012 book from its Amazon page.
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May 15, 2020

May 15, 2020 By

Ward Ricker is (as so often) a self-described former “fundamentalist” who likes to poke holes in the Bible and “prove” that it is a terrible and “evil” book, not inspired, hopelessly contradictory, etc. He describes his current belief as follows:

Some people would refer to me as an “atheist”, which is perhaps accurate, since I don’t believe in god, but I don’t particularly like the word “atheist”, since it only tells you what I don’t believe, i.e,, that I don’t believe in god or gods. It doesn’t tell you what I do believe in. “Scientist” tells you what I do believe in.

He read my article for National Catholic Register, “Atheist Inventions of Many Bogus ‘Bible Contradictions’ “ (9-4-18) and wrote to NCR the following letter. This article is my response. I informed him personally of it. First, here is his letter:

I just came across the Sept. 4, 2018, article, Atheist Inventions of Many Bogus “Bible Contradictions”, by Dave Armstrong.  It is an interesting article, in that it claims that “atheists” make unsubstantiated claims about the Bible contradicting itself, yet the article doesn’t list a single one of these unsubstantiated contradictions.  Instead, it goes into a ridiculous story about some people going to a Dairy Queen, trying to suggest that this represents the type of arguments that “atheists” use, without giving any example of an “atheist” argument that follows that same reasoning.
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In fact, Mr. Armstrong is correct; many Bible critics (“atheists” or otherwise) will use some pretty ridiculous arguments (such as saying that the Bible says Jonah was swallowed by a whale in one place and by a fish in another).  I’m surprised that he didn’t choose to list any.  But the fact that some people get carried away and make false claims doesn’t invalidate the claims that are correct.  And the fact is that there are a large number of clear contradictions in the so-called “inerrant word of god”.  I have screened out those bogus claims that some critics make and have published my own book (yes, another of those lists that Mr. Armstrong decries) of contradictions that I and others have found in the Bible that are clearly contradictions.  Would Mr. Armstrong or any of you like to challenge any of the over 400 contradictions that I list in one of the chapters of my book, “Unholy Bible,” that you can download for free at www.WardsBooks.com?  (I hope you will also read the other chapters in the book about the vile, evil and abhorrent book that is called the “Holy Bible”.)

One must always determine the purpose and scope of any particular article, before one sets out to critique it. I always try to be very precise and accurately descriptive in titles for my articles. It’s one of the first things any good writer must understand (book and article titles, chapter titles, etc.). We only have 1000 words per article at NCR. I think it’s a nice length, that usually comes out to about 3 1/2 single-spaced pages in a book with a standard font size. People have short attention spans nowadays.

I was specifically going after “bogus ‘contradictions'”: that is, alleged logical contradictions that actually aren’t so, by the laws of contradiction in the field of logic (I took a logic class in college, by the way, along with several other philosophy courses). The Dairy Queen story was, precisely, an analogical example of how atheists and others who don’t properly think through the nature of a literal logical contradiction, make the claim, when in fact, there is no contradiction present at all.

Mr. Ricker may think that is “ridiculous.” I think it is necessary in order to illustrate the common errors in identifying the presence of “contradictions” that I was critiquing. The main gist of my article was to explain the nature of a logical contradiction, as opposed to refuting particular proposed examples of same in the Bible by atheists.

Sure, it would have been nice to include some actual “atheist vs. the Bible” examples, but there simply wasn’t space to do so, after I made what was my primary point in the article: illustrating how many alleged “contradictions” actually aren’t at all. This is a different issue from other examples which appear (at least prima facie) to be actual (honestly alleged) contradictions, that have to be grappled with by the defender of an inspired Bible.
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Oftentimes, that comes down to different genres in the Bible, various meanings of particular words or ideas in widely divergent contexts, translation matters, and interpretational particulars: often having to do with the very foreign (to our modern western sensibilities)  ancient Hebrew culture and modes of thinking. I know these things firsthand, because I myself have offered what I think are good resolutions or “solutions” to hundreds of proposed biblical “contradictions.”

Other times, it could simply be a matter of manuscript errors that crept in through the years. Of course, that sort of error is only in transmission, and is not part of the original text, so it wouldn’t cast doubt on the non-contradictory nature of the original transcripts of the Bible (if indeed we can plausibly speculate that it was merely an innocent copyist’s error).

I do have an article on my blog of what Mr. Ricker suggests: where I provide several actual examples from atheists: Review of The Book of Non-Contradiction (Phillip Campbell) [5-9-17]. It was 1666 words long.
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I have dealt with literally hundreds of supposed biblical “contradictions” (I’ve been engaged in apologetics writing for 39 years). One can see how active I have been in dialoguing with atheists, on my web page devoted to them. On the issue of “Bible contradictions” in particular, I devote a very long section at the end of my Bible and Tradition web page. Mr. Ricker offered a challenge for me or anyone to deal with his “list” of what he thinks are logical biblical difficulties. I like that. It shows that he is confident of his position. I admire that in people, even if I disagree with what they defend or stand for.
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I thought that Bob Seidensticker, webmaster of Cross Examined: a major atheist blog with tons and tons of feedback in the comboxes, also possessed this confidence in his own positions, since he directly challenged me on 8-11-18: “I’ve got 1000+ posts here attacking your worldview. You just going to let that stand? Or could you present a helpful new perspective that I’ve ignored on one or two of those posts?” This was after Bob had virtually begged and pleaded with me to dialogue with him in May 2018, via email. He commented to someone else on 6-22-17: “If I’ve misunderstood the Christian position or Christian arguments, point that out. Show me where I’ve mischaracterized them.”
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Again, Bob mocked some Christian in his combox on 10-27-18: “You can’t explain it to us, you can’t defend it, you can’t even defend it to yourself. Defend your position or shut up about it. It’s clear you have nothing.” And again on the same day: “If you can’t answer the question, man up and say so.” And on 10-26-18: “you refuse to defend it, after being asked over and over again.” And again: “You’re the one playing games, equivocating, and being unable to answer the challenges.”
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I’m not one to decline a challenge, if I think anything constructive can be accomplished by responding to it, so I took Bob up on his offer, and to date, have written literally 40 refutations of his anti-biblical claims and argumentation. So far, not one peep of a response has been heard from him to any of them. And it sure looks like that will be the case indefinitely. His bark is infinitely worse than his bite. All talk and no action . . .

He’s not the only atheist online who waxes so confidently, but then flees for the hills at the slightest whiff of a refutation of ostensibly self-assured claims. Atheist and former Methodist minister Dr. David Madison writes for the very popular Debunking Christianity site, run by atheist John “you are an idiot!” Loftus, infamous for his literally volcanic explosions and implosions when he is forthrightly challenged (especially when such challenges come from me). I have refuted Dr. Madison’s skeptical, Bible-bashing claims 42 times as of this writing. He hasn’t been heard back from as of yet, either, and made his cramped, insulated mentality quite clear in a comment from 9-6-19:

[T]he burden of the apologist has become heavy indeed, and some don’t handle the anguish well. They vent and rage at critics, like toddlers throwing tantrums when a threadbare security blanket gets tossed out. We can smell their panic. Engaging with the ranters serves no purpose—any more than it does to engage with Flat-Earthers, Chemtrail conspiracy theorists, and those who argue that the moon landings were faked. . . . I prefer to engage with NON-obsessive-compulsive-hysterical Christians, those who have spotted rubbish in the Bible, and might already have one foot out the door.
By the time he had written this rationalization of his intellectual cowardice, I had already refuted his particular arguments 35 times. I’ve also done the same with John Loftus, more than ten times. You guessed it: not one word in counter-reply. I had critiqued his book, Why I Became an Atheist: precisely because at one time (in December 2006) he directly challenged me to do so:
Deconversion stories are piecemeal. They cannot give a full explanation for why someone left the faith. They only give hints at why they left the faith. It requires writing a whole book about why someone left the faith to understand why they did, and few people do that. I did. If you truly want to critique my deconversion story then critique my book. . . . I challenge you to really critique the one deconversion story that has been published in a book. . . . Do you accept my challenge?

Eventually, after I became bored and was looking for something to do, I did just that, only to get stony silence and crickets back. This is most unimpressive. It’s now over 100 direct refutations of atheist anti-biblical arguments (there are others, too, besides these three cowards), with no replies whatsoever back from those same atheists: two of whom directly challenged me to do this very thing.

This is pretty much my universal experience with atheists. Mr. Ricker finds the same apathy and/or cowardice or non-interest among Christians. We have that in common. I don’t like to repeat work that I’ve already done, so I would propose the following to him: take on one or more of these 92 papers in which I refuted Dr. Madison, Mr Seidensticker, and Mr. Loftus (since they won’t).

Prove to my Christian readers that atheists are capable of actually defending their positions under scrutiny: not just asserting them and fleeing to the hills in terror at the first hint or sign of a vigorous Christian counter-reply. They won’t respond; maybe Mr. Ricker, having devoted a book to such things, will. In any event, I have put my money where my mouth is, and I am able and willing to 1) defend my general Christian and particular Catholic beliefs, and 2) respond to atheist challenges to same.

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Photo credit: Clare Black (9-2-09) [Flickr / CC BY 2.0 license]
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December 12, 2019

December 12, 2019 By

And did Jesus minister exclusively to Jews and not Gentiles at all (an alleged Gospel inconsistency)?

Dr. David Madison is an atheist who was a Methodist minister for nine years: with a Ph.D. in Biblical Studies from Boston University.  You can see (by the number in the title) how many times I have replied to his videos or articles. Thus far, I haven’t heard one peep back from him  (from 8-1-19 to this date). This certainly doesn’t suggest to me that he is very confident in his opinions. All I’ve seen is expressions of contempt from Dr. Madison and from his buddy, the atheist author, polemicist, and extraordinarily volatile John Loftus, who runs the ultra-insulting Debunking Christianity blog. Dr. Madison made his cramped, insulated mentality clear in a comment from 9-6-19:

[T]he burden of the apologist has become heavy indeed, and some don’t handle the anguish well. They vent and rage at critics, like toddlers throwing tantrums when a threadbare security blanket gets tossed out. We can smell their panic. Engaging with the ranters serves no purpose—any more than it does to engage with Flat-Earthers, Chemtrail conspiracy theorists, and those who argue that the moon landings were faked. . . . I prefer to engage with NON-obsessive-compulsive-hysterical Christians, those who have spotted rubbish in the Bible, and might already have one foot out the door.

John “you are an idiot!” Loftus even went to the length of changing his blog’s rules of engagement, so that he and Dr. Madison could avoid replying to yours truly, or even see notices of my replies (er, sorry, rants, rather).

This is one of the replies to Dr. Madison’s series, “Things we Wish Jesus Hadn’t Said” (podcast episodes 13-25). I have already replied to every previous episode. He states in his introduction to this second series:

[A]pologists (preachers and priests) who explain away—well, they try—the nasty and often grim message in many of the sayings attributed to Jesus. Indeed, the gospels are a minefield; many negatives about Jesus are in full view.

I am replying to episode 13, entitled, “Matthew 15:22-28, Jesus calls a Gentile woman a dog” (7-23-19).  Dr. Madison’s words will be in blue, and those of other atheists in purple, green, and brown.

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Matthew 15:22-28 (RSV) And behold, a Canaanite woman from that region came out and cried, “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David; my daughter is severely possessed by a demon.” [23] But he did not answer her a word. And his disciples came and begged him, saying, “Send her away, for she is crying after us.” [24] He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” [25] But she came and knelt before him, saying, “Lord, help me.” [26] And he answered, “It is not fair to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” [27] She said, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.” [28] Then Jesus answered her, “O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire.” And her daughter was healed instantly.

In this installment, Dr. Madison trots out what is apparently a big favorite of anti-theist atheist polemicists. This is my fourth time dealing with it, so it’s nothing new. One atheist who goes by the nick “BeeryUSA” stated that this very thing ( a complete misunderstanding on his part) made him cease to be a Christian:

I recall the precise passage that I was reading when I realized that Jesus was actually a xenophobic nationalist . . . and therefore could not be any kind of god I could worship:

Matthew 15:24 He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”

So this psycho Jesus refuses to treat a woman’s daughter simply because she was a Canaanite. All of a sudden, my desire to give Jesus the benefit of the doubt melted away and, with my new-found skepticism, it didn’t take long from there for all the rest of it to unravel.

Likewise, Bible-Basher Bob Seidensticker (whom I have refuted 35 times with no reply whatsoever), opined:

At the end of the gospel story, Jesus has risen and is giving the disciples their final instructions.

Make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19).

This is the familiar Great Commission, and it’s a lot more generous than what has been called the lesser commission that appears earlier in the same gospel:

These twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: “Do not go among the Gentiles or enter any town of the Samaritans. Go rather to the lost sheep of Israel.” (Matthew 10:5–6)

This was not a universal message. We see it again in his encounter with the Canaanite woman:

[Jesus rejected her plea to heal her daughter, saying] “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.”

The woman came and knelt before him. “Lord, help me!” she said.

He replied, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.” (Matthew 15:24–6)

You might say that a ministry with limited resources had to prioritize, but that doesn’t apply here. Don’t forget that Jesus was omnipotent. . . . 

Let’s revisit the fact that Matthew is contradictory when it says both “Make disciples of all nations” and “Do not go among the Gentiles [but only] to the lost sheep of Israel.” There are no early papyrus copies of Matthew 28 (the “Make disciples of all nations” chapter), and the earliest copies of this chapter are in the codices copied in the mid-300s. That’s almost three centuries of silence from original to our best copies, a lot of opportunity for the Great Commission to get “improved” by copyists. I’m not saying it was, of course; I’m simply offering one explanation for why the gospel in Matthew has Jesus change so fundamental a tenet as who he came to save.

Dr. Madison’s buddy, John Loftus also chimed in, along the same lines, in his book, Why I Became an Atheist (revised version, 2012, 536 pages). I have now critiqued it ten times without (you guessed it!) any counter-reply from him. In it, he  wrote:

[H]e also called a Syrophoenician woman part of a race of “dogs” and only begrudgingly helped her (Mark 7:24-30). (p. 123)

Now, Dr. David Madison comes along in his podcast and makes these claims:

But guess what? In Matthew 28, at the end of the Gospel, verse 19, the resurrected Jesus says, “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations.” . . . this Jesus quote was probably added to the story then [50 years after Jesus’ death] and it certainly does not match, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” The Gospel writer didn’t notice much, contradictions, sometimes. . . . what a nasty thing to say: “it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” . . . The ideal Jesus that people adore is punctured by this Jesus, quote: this insult, calling her a dog.

Apologists Eric Lyons and Kyle Butt thoroughly dispense of this “objection” concerning Jesus’ use of the word “dog” (complete with a good dose of sorely needed humor) in their article, “Was Jesus Unkind to the Syrophoenician Woman?”:

To our 21st-century ears, the idea that Jesus would refer to the Gentiles as “little dogs” has the potential to sound belittling and unkind. When we consider how we often use animal terms in illustrative or idiomatic ways, however, Jesus’ comments are much more benign. For instance, suppose a particular lawyer exhibits unyielding tenacity. We might say he is a “bulldog” when he deals with the evidence. Or we might say that a person is “as cute as a puppy” or has “puppy-dog eyes.” If someone has a lucky day, we might say something like “every dog has its day.” Or if an adult refuses to learn to use new technology, we might say that “you can’t teach an old dog new tricks.” In addition, one might say that a person “works like a dog,” is the “top dog” at the office, or is “dog tired.” Obviously, to call someone “top dog” would convey no derogatory connotation.

For Jesus’ statement to be construed as unkind or wrong in some way, a person would be forced to prove that the illustration or idiom He used to refer to the Gentiles as “little dogs” must be taken in a derogatory fashion. Such cannot be proved. In fact, the term Jesus used for “little dogs” could easily be taken in an illustrative way without any type of unkind insinuation. In his commentary on Mark, renowned commentator R.C.H. Lenski translated the Greek term used by Jesus (kunaria) as “little pet dogs.” . . . Lenski goes on to write concerning Jesus’ statement: “All that Jesus does is to ask the disciples and the woman to accept the divine plan that Jesus must work out his mission among the Jews…. Any share of Gentile individuals in any of these blessings can only be incidental during Jesus’ ministry in Israel” . . .

Consider that Matthew had earlier recorded how a Roman centurion approached Jesus on behalf of his paralyzed servant. Jesus did not respond in that instance as He did with the Syrophoenician woman. He simply stated: “I will come and heal him” (8:7). After witnessing the centurion’s refreshing humility and great faith (pleading for Christ to “only speak a word” and his servant would be healed—vss. 8-9), Jesus responded: “I have not found such great faith, not even in Israel” (vs. 10, emp. added). . . .

What many people miss in this story is what is so evident in other parts of Scripture: Jesus was testing this Canaanite woman, while at the same time teaching His disciples how the tenderhearted respond to possibly offensive truths. . . .

Before people “dog” Jesus for the way He used an animal illustration, they might need to reconsider that “their bark is much worse than their bite” when it comes to insinuating that Jesus was unkind and intolerant. In truth, they are simply “barking up the wrong tree” by attempting to call Jesus’ character into question. They need to “call off the dogs” on this one and “let sleeping dogs lie.”

As to the groundless charge of internal contradiction (sent to Israel only / disciples evangelize Israel only “vs.” evangelizing the whole world), here is my reply:

First of all, being sent to Israel doesn’t also mean that He would ignore all non-Israelis. This is untrue. The woman at the well was a Samaritan. He told the story about the good Samaritan who helped the guy who had been beaten, and concluded that he was a better neighbor than a Jew who didn’t do these things. He healed the Roman centurion’s servant, and commended his faith as better than most Jews. The Bible says that He healed this woman’s daughter (and highly commended her mother for her faith).

In the whole passage (blessed context), we readily see that Jesus was merely asking (as He often did) a rhetorical question. In effect He was asking her, “why should I heal your daughter?” She gave a great answer, and He (knowing all along that she would say what she did) did heal her.

I fail to see how this passage proves that Jesus didn’t give a fig about non-Jews. He healed the Canaanite woman’s daughter! How does that prove what atheists contend? Jesus heals a Canaanite girl (after being asked to by her mother), and that “proves” that He only healed and preached to Jews; hence it is a “contradiction”? Surely, this is a form of “logic” that no one’s ever seen before.

Another example, even more famous, is Jesus’ interaction with the Samaritan woman at the well (John 4:4-29). He shares the Gospel very explicitly with her, stating that He is the source of eternal life (4:14), and that He is the Jewish Messiah (4:25-26): a thing that she later proclaimed in the city (4:28-29, 39-42).

The text even notes that — normally — Jews avoided Samaritans: “The Samaritan woman said to him, ‘How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samar’ia?’ For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans” (4:9; RSV).

A third instance of Jesus’ outreach beyond the Jews is His interaction with the Roman centurion:

Matthew 8:5-13 As he entered Caper’na-um, a centurion came forward to him, beseeching him [6] and saying, “Lord, my servant is lying paralyzed at home, in terrible distress.” [7] And he said to him, “I will come and heal him.” [8] But the centurion answered him, “Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof; but only say the word, and my servant will be healed. [9] For I am a man under authority, with soldiers under me; and I say to one, `Go,’ and he goes, and to another, `Come,’ and he comes, and to my slave, `Do this,’ and he does it.” [10] When Jesus heard him, he marveled, and said to those who followed him, “Truly, I say to you, not even in Israel have I found such faith. [11] I tell you, many will come from east and west and sit at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, [12] while the sons of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness; there men will weep and gnash their teeth.” [13] And to the centurion Jesus said, “Go; be it done for you as you have believed.” And the servant was healed at that very moment.

Note how Jesus not only readily healed the Roman centurion’s servant (8:7, 13), but also “marveled” at his faith and commended it as superior to the faith of anyone “in Israel” (8:10). And that led Him to observe that many Gentiles will be saved, whereas many Jews will not be saved (8:11-12). But there is much more:

A fourth example is Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:29-37). The whole point of it was to show that Samaritans were truly neighbors to Jews if they helped them, as the man did in the parable. I drove on the road (from Jerusalem to Jericho) which was the setting of this parable.

A fifth example is from the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus told His followers, “You are the light of the world” (Matthew 5:14).

A sixth example is the common motif of Jesus saying that He came to save not just Jews, but the world (Jn 6:33, 51; 8:12 [“I am the light of the world”]; 9:5; 12:46 [“I have come as light into the world . . .”]; 12:47 [“to save the world”]; ). The Evangelists in the Gospels, and John the Baptist state the same (Jn 1:29; 3:16-17, 19).

A seventh example is Jesus praying for His disciples in their missionary efforts: “As thou didst send me into the world, so I have sent them into the world” (John 17:18).

An eighth example is the parable of the weeds, which showed a universal mission field fifteen chapters before Matthew 28: “He who sows the good seed is the Son of man; [38] the field is the world, and the good seed means the sons of the kingdom; . . .” (13:37-38).

A ninth example is Jesus’ statements that “all men” can potentially be saved (Jn 12:32; 13:35).

The book of Acts recounts St. Peter and St. Paul massively reaching out to Gentiles. I need not spend any time documenting that.

As anyone can see, the evidence in the Bible against this ridiculous atheist critique is abundant and undeniable. Jesus never says (nor does the entire New Testament ever say) that He came to “save Israel” or be the “savior of Israel.” Anyone who doesn’t believe me can do a word search (here’s the tool to do it). Verify it yourself. He only claims to be the “Messiah” of Israel (Jn 4:25-26): which is a different thing. When Jesus says who it is that He came to save (i.e., provided they are willing), He states explicitly that He came “to save the lost” (Lk 19:10) and “to save the world” (Jn 12:47).

Likewise, St. Paul states that “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners” (1 Timothy 1:15). Last I checked, sinful human beings were not confined solely to the class of Jews or Israelis.

***

Unfortunately, Money Trees Do Not Exist: If you have been aided in any way by my work, or think it is valuable and worthwhile, please strongly consider financially supporting it (even $10 / month — a mere 33 cents a day — would be very helpful). I have been a full-time Catholic apologist since Dec. 2001, and have been writing Christian apologetics since 1981 (see my Resume). My work has been proven (by God’s grace alone) to be fruitful, in terms of changing lives (see the tangible evidences from unsolicited “testimonies”). I have to pay my bills like all of you: and have a (homeschooling) wife and three children still at home to provide for, and a mortgage to pay.
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My book royalties from three bestsellers in the field (published in 2003-2007) have been decreasing, as has my overall income, making it increasingly difficult to make ends meet.  I provide over 2600 free articles here, for the purpose of your edification and education, and have written 50 books. It’ll literally be a struggle to survive financially until Dec. 2020, when both my wife and I will be receiving Social Security. If you cannot contribute, I ask for your prayers (and “likes” and links and shares). Thanks!
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See my information on how to donate (including 100% tax-deductible donations). It’s very simple to contribute to my apostolate via PayPal, if a tax deduction is not needed (my “business name” there is called “Catholic Used Book Service,” from my old bookselling days 17 or so years ago, but send to my email: apologistdave@gmail.com). Another easy way to send and receive money (with a bank account or a mobile phone) is through Zelle. Again, just send to my e-mail address. May God abundantly bless you.
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Photo credit: The Woman of Canaan at the Feet of Christ (1784, by Jean Germain Drouais (1763-1788) [public domain / Wikimedia Commons]
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December 10, 2019

December 10, 2019 By

Dr. David Madison is an atheist who was a Methodist minister for nine years: with a Ph.D. in Biblical Studies from Boston University.  You can see (by the number in the title) how many times I have replied to his videos or articles. Thus far, I haven’t heard one peep back from him  (from 8-1-19 to this date). This certainly doesn’t suggest to me that he is very confident in his opinions. All I’ve seen is expressions of contempt from Dr. Madison and from his buddy, atheist author and polemicist, the extraordinarily volatile John Loftus, who runs the notoriously insulting Debunking Christianity blog.

Loftus even went to the length of changing his blog’s rules of engagement, in order for himself and Dr. Madison to avoid replying to me. Obviously, I have “hit a nerve” over there. In any event, their utter non-responses and intellectual cowardice do not affect me in the slightest. No skin off of my back. If I want to critique more of their material, I will. If my replies go out unopposed, all the better for my cause.

This is a reply to a portion of Dr. Madison’s article, Christianity Gets Slam-Dunked (8-16-19).  Dr. Madison’s words will be in blue below.

*****

A review of Tim Sledge’s Four Disturbing Questions with One Simple Answer

. . . I always welcome books that expose the flaws, especially one that is as highly readable as Tim Sledge’s short new book (120 pages), Four Disturbing Questions with One Simple Answer: Breaking the Spell of Christian Belief. With ease and precision, Sledge focuses on just four realities that do indeed shatter the Christian spell.

. . . for thirty years he was an evangelical Southern Baptist minister, a Number 10 Christian. In his longer book, Goodbye Jesus: An Evangelical Preacher’s Journey Beyond Faith [my review is here], Sledge mentions his practice over the years of relegating his reservations—things about the faith that didn’t make sense—to a corner of his mind that he labeled, Exceptions to the Rule of Faith. Eventually the items deposited there became too weighty.

In his new book he distills many of these into four knockout categories, hence the title, Four Disturbing Questions:

(1) The Power Failure Question
(2) The Mixed Message Question
(3) The Germ Warfare Question
(4) The Better Plan Question

[. . . ]

This is the Germ Warfare Question:

“Why didn’t Jesus say anything about germs.” (p. 46)

We may wonder: Just when did Jesus become a full participant in the Holy Trinity, i.e., knowing everything that God knows? John’s gospel tells us that Jesus was present right there at creation. It’s bit difficult to reconcile this with a Galilean peasant preacher who could very well have been illiterate.

Really? It’s pretty tough to be illiterate when one reads biblical texts in a synagogue:

Luke 4:16 (RSV) And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up; and he went to the synagogue, as his custom was, on the sabbath day. And he stood up to read;

Moreover, there are the several instances of Jesus rhetorically asking about whether His detractors had read various Old Testament passages (ones that He had obviously read), with the words, “have you not read . . . ?” And there are His many references to “scripture[s]”: with which He was obviously familiar. But I guess this is the sort of “higher-level learning” and logic that is (amazingly enough) beyond Dr. David Madison, doctorate (in biblical studies) and all. For him, Jesus was — more likely than not — illiterate.

But if John got it right, why not use his time on earth to pass along really useful knowledge?

Sledge provides a helpful survey of discoveries about microbes in the 19th and 20th centuries, after billions of humans had suffered horrible deaths from disease. Yet we have a thousand pages of Bible that gives no information at all about how the real world works. “But it’s hard to argue,” Sledge says, “that any time was too soon for humans to learn about the microscopic organisms that cause so much sickness and death—germs.” (p. 35)

Yet Jesus the moralist was more concerned about sin. “Nothing outside a person can defile them by going into them. Rather, it is what comes out of a person that defiles them.” (Mark 7:15). Sledge is generous, but gets in his zinger: “…Jesus was focused on the importance of inner spiritual change over outward religious ceremony. But wouldn’t this have been a great time to explain that they should wash their hands for health purposes, a good time to tell people about germs, a good time to talk about why they should be careful where they get their drinking water, along with a few tips about sewage disposal?” (p. 42)

“Why didn’t the God of the universe—walking among mankind in the flesh as Jesus—do a sidebar talk on germs?” (p. 43)

“God had been watching silently for thousands of years by the time Jesus came along. It was late in the game, but couldn’t the Son of God—the one described as the Great Physician—have made a greater contribution to human health than healing a few people while he was on earth?” (p. 46)

Horrendous suffering—both human and animal—is built in; it’s just how the world works. Any theism that posits a caring, Master-Craftsman god, collapses on that fact alone, and this Sledge chapter is a good primer for those who rarely consider the implication of germs for their concept of a good God.

***

It so happens that I have already thoroughly answered this challenge. Atheists mostly recycle old chestnuts in their arsenal of Christian-bashing pseudo-pseudo [fallacious] supposed “arguments”. Thus, we observe that atheist Bob Seidensticker, whom I have also refuted 35 times (and again with utterly no reply back, since he is just as much an intellectual coward as Dr. Madison) brought this up in his hit-piece, “Yet More on the Bible’s Confused Relationship with Science (2 of 2)” (12-2-15), where he pontificated:

10. Germs? What germs?

The Bible isn’t a reliable source of health information. . . . physical health and basic hygienic precautions are not obvious and are worth a mention somewhere. How about telling us that boiling water minimizes disease? Or how to site latrines to safeguard the water supply?

I’ll re-post my lengthy and (I think) devastating reply to this accusation in a moment. But first let me provide my previous answer to his closing lie / potshot:

Let me close with a paraphrase of an idea from AronRa: When the answer is known, science knows it. But when science doesn’t know it, neither does religion.

That’s not true. As shown, Hippocrates, the pagan Greek “father of medicine” didn’t understand the causes of contagious disease. Nor did medical science until the 19th century. But the hygienic principles that would have prevented the spread of such diseases were in the Bible: in the Laws of Moses.

St. Augustine in the 5th century and St. Thomas Aquinas in the 13th, both rejected astrology long before modern science, while even the most prominent modern scientists in the 16th-17th centuries, such as Galileo, Tycho Brahe, and Kepler firmly believed in it.

I could go on and on, but just a few examples suffice to decisively refute a foolishly ignorant universal negative claim.

And of course, modern science (virtually the atheist’s religion: “scientism”), for all its admirable qualities and glories (I love science!) is not without much embarrassing error and foolishness, and skeletons in its own closet: like belief in the 41-year successful hoax of “Piltdown Man”. This is true even up to very recent times, as I have detailed for atheists’ convenience.

***

Here, then, is my reply (from over two months ago, contra Seidensticker’s similar “argument”) to the supposed “slam-dunk” against Christianity (made by Tim Sledge and ballyhooed by Dr. David Madison): alleged ignorance of God and the Bible regarding germs and their devastating effects:

***

Once again, five minutes searching on Google would have prevented Bob from spewing more ignorance about the Bible. The Bible Ask site has an article, “Did the Bible teach the germs theory?” (5-30-16):

The Bible writers did not write a medical textbook. However, there are numerous rules for sanitation, quarantine, and other medical procedures (found in the first 5 book of the OT) . . .

Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis (1818 –1865), who was a Hungarian physician, . . . [He] proposed the practice of washing hands with chlorinated lime solutions in 1847 . . . He published a book of his findings in Etiology, Concept and Prophylaxis of Childbed Fever. Despite various publications of his successful results, Semmelweis’s suggestions were not accepted by the medical community of his time.

Why was Semmelweis research rejected? Because germs were virtually a foreign concept for the Europeans in the middle-19th-century. . . .

Had the medical community paid attention to God’s instructions that were given 3000 years before, many lives would have been saved. The Lord gave the Israelites hygienic principles against the contamination of germs and taught the necessity to quarantine the sick (Numbers 19:11-12). And the book of Leviticus lists a host of diseases and ways where a person would come in contact with germs (Leviticus 13:46).

Germs were no new discovery in 1847. And for this fact, Roderick McGrew testified in the Encyclopedia of Medical History: “The idea of contagion was foreign to the classic medical tradition and found no place in the voluminous Hippocratic writings. The Old Testament, however, is a rich source for contagionist sentiment, especially in regard to leprosy and venereal disease” (1985, pp. 77-78).

Some other interesting facts regarding the Bible and germ theory:

1. The Bible contained instructions for the Israelites to wash their bodies and clothes in running water if they had a discharge, came in contact with someone else’s discharge, or had touched a dead body. They were also instructed about objects that had come into contact with dead things, and about purifying items with an unknown history with either fire or running water. They were also taught to bury human waste outside the camp, and to burn animal waste (Num 19:3-22; Lev. 11:1-47; 15:1-33; Deut 23:12).

2. Leviticus 13 and 14 mention leprosy on walls and on garments. Leprosy is a bacterial disease, and can survive for three weeks or longer apart from the human body. Thus, God commanded that the garments of leprosy victims should be burned (Lev 13:52).

3. It was not until 1873 that leprosy was shown to be an infectious disease rather than hereditary. Of course, the laws of Moses already were aware of that (Lev 13, 14, 22; Num 19:20). It contains instructions about quarantine and about quarantined persons needing to thoroughly shave and wash. Priests who cared for them also were instructed to change their clothes and wash thoroughly. The Israelites were the only culture to practice quarantine until the 19th century, when medical advances discovered the biblical medical principles and practices.

4. Hippocrates, the “father of medicine” (born 460 BC), thought “bad air” from swampy areas was the cause of disease.

See also: “Old Testament Laws About Infectious Diseases.”

The entry on “Health” in Baker’s Evangelical Dictionary of Biblical Theology reveals that ordinary medicinal remedies were widely practiced in Bible times. There wasn’t solely a belief that sin or demons caused all disease (as Bob often implies in his anti-Christian writings, and in this paper: “According to the Bible, evil spirits cause disease.”). There was also a natural cause-and-effect understanding:

Ordinary means of healing were of most diverse kinds. Balm ( Gen 37:25 ) is thought to have been an aromatic resin (or juice) with healing properties; oil was the universal emollient ( Isa 1:6 ), and was sometimes used for wounds with cleansing wine ( Luke 10:34 ). Isaiah recommended a fig poultice for a boil ( 38:21 ); healing springs and saliva were thought effectual ( Mark 8:23 ; John 5 ; 9:6-7 ). Medicine is mentioned ( Prov 17:22 ) and defended as “sensible” ( Sirach 38:4). Wine mixed with myrrh was considered sedative ( Mark 15:23 ); mint, dill, and cummin assisted digestion ( Matt 23:23 ); other herbs were recommended for particular disorders. Most food rules had both ritual and dietary purposes, while raisins, pomegranates, milk, and honey were believed to assist restoration. . . .

Luke’s constant care of Paul reminds us that nonmiraculous means of healing were not neglected in that apostolic circle. Wine is recommended for Timothy’s weak stomach, eye-salve for the Thyatiran church’s blindness (metaphorical, but significant).

Doctors today often note how the patient’s disposition and attitude has a strong effect on his health or recovery. The mind definitely influences the body. Solomon understood this in several of his Proverbs: written around 950 BC (Prov 14:30; 15:30; 16:24; 17:22).

***

Further note of 12-10-19: since Jesus observed Mosaic Law, including ritual washings, etc., He tacitly accepted (by His example of following it) the aspects of it that anticipated and “understood” germ theory. The knowledge was already in existence.

***

Unfortunately, Money Trees Do Not Exist: If you have been aided in any way by my work, or think it is valuable and worthwhile, please strongly consider financially supporting it (even $10 / month — a mere 33 cents a day — would be very helpful). I have been a full-time Catholic apologist since Dec. 2001, and have been writing Christian apologetics since 1981 (see my Resume). My work has been proven (by God’s grace alone) to be fruitful, in terms of changing lives (see the tangible evidences from unsolicited “testimonies”). I have to pay my bills like all of you: and have a (homeschooling) wife and three children still at home to provide for, and a mortgage to pay.
*
My book royalties from three bestsellers in the field (published in 2003-2007) have been decreasing, as has my overall income, making it increasingly difficult to make ends meet.  I provide over 2600 free articles here, for the purpose of your edification and education, and have written 50 books. It’ll literally be a struggle to survive financially until Dec. 2020, when both my wife and I will be receiving Social Security. If you cannot contribute, I ask for your prayers (and “likes” and links and shares). Thanks!
*
See my information on how to donate (including 100% tax-deductible donations). It’s very simple to contribute to my apostolate via PayPal, if a tax deduction is not needed (my “business name” there is called “Catholic Used Book Service,” from my old bookselling days 17 or so years ago, but send to my email: apologistdave@gmail.com). Another easy way to send and receive money (with a bank account or a mobile phone) is through Zelle. Again, just send to my e-mail address. May God abundantly bless you.
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Photo credit: Portrait of Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis (1818-1865), the Hungarian-Austrian physician, who discovered the principles of germ theory and hygiene, some 3000 years after Moses taught them in what became the Old Testament. Better late than never! This file comes from Wellcome Images, a website operated by Wellcome Trust, a global charitable foundation based in the United Kingdom. Refer to Wellcome blog post (archive). [Wikimedia Commons / Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license]
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September 11, 2019

September 11, 2019 By

This is the last of my ten critiques of Why I Became an Atheist, by John W. Loftus.

I first ran across former Christian minister Loftus back in 2006. We dialogued about the problem of evil, and whether God was in time. During that period I also replied to an online version of his deconversion: which (like my arguments about God and time) he didn’t care for at all. I’ve critiqued many atheist deconversion stories, and maintain a very extensive web page about atheism. In 2007 I critiqued his “Outsider Test of Faith” series: to which he gave no response. Loftus’ biggest objection to my critique of his descent into atheism was that I responded to what he called a “brief testimony.” He wrote in December 2006 (his words in blue henceforth):

Deconversion stories are piecemeal. They cannot give a full explanation for why someone left the faith. They only give hints at why they left the faith. It requires writing a whole book about why someone left the faith to understand why they did, and few people do that. I did. If you truly want to critique my deconversion story then critique my book. . . . I challenge you to really critique the one deconversion story that has been published in a book. . . . Do you accept my challenge?

I declined at that time, mainly (but not solely) for the following stated reason:

If you send me your book in an e-file for free, I’d be more than happy to critique it. I won’t buy it, and I refuse to type long portions of it when it is possible to cut-and-paste. That is an important factor since my methodology is Socratic and point-by-point. . . . You railed against that, saying that it was a “handout.” I responded that you could have any of my (14 completed) books in e-book form for free.

Throughout August 2019, I critiqued Dr. David Madison, a prominent contributor to Loftus’ website, Debunking Christianity, no less than 35 times. As of this writing, they remain completely unanswered. I was simply providing (as a courtesy) links to my critiques underneath each article of Dr. Madison’s, till Loftus decided I couldn’t do that (after having claimed that I “hate” atheists and indeed, everyone I disagree with). I replied at length regarding his censorship on his website. Loftus’ explanation for the complete non-reply to my 35 critiques was this: “We know we can respond. It’s just that we don’t have the time to do so. Plus, it’s pretty clear our time would be better spent doing something else than wrestling in the mud with you.” Meanwhile, I discovered that Dr. Madison wrote glowingly about Loftus on 1-23-17:

When the history of Christianity’s demise is written (it will fade eventually away, as do all religions), your name will feature prominently as one who helped bring the world to its senses. Your legacy is secure and is much appreciated.

This was underneath an article where Loftus claimed: “I’ve kicked this dead rodent of the Christian faith into a lifeless blob so many times there is nothing left of it.” I hadn’t realized that Loftus had single-handedly managed to accomplish the stupendous feat of vanquishing the Hideous Beast of Christianity (something the Roman Empire, Muslims, Communists, and many others all miserably failed to do). Loftus waxed humbly and modestly ten days later: “I cannot resist the supposition that my books are among the best. . . . Every one of my books is unique, doing what few other atheist books have done, if any of them.”

These last three cited statements put me “over the edge” and I decided to buy a used copy of his book, Why I Became an Atheist (revised version, 2012, 536 pages) and critique it, as he wanted me to do in 2006. Moreover, on 8-27-07 he made a blanket challenge about the original version of this book: “I challenge someone to try this with my book. I might learn a few things, and that’s always a goal of mine. Pick it up and deal with as many arguments in it that you can. Deal with them all if you can.” His wish is granted (I think he will at length regret it), and this will be my primary project (as a professional apologist) in the coming weeks.

Despite all his confident bluster, I fully expect him to ignore my critiques: just like Madison and “Bible Basher” Bob Seidensticker, who also has ignored 35 of my critiques (that he requested I do). If Loftus decides to defend his views, I’m here; always have been. And I won’t flee for the hills, like atheists habitually do, when faced with substantive criticism.

The words of John Loftus will be in blue.

*****

Judge Jephthah sacrificed his daughter to “God” (Judg. 11:39). Was the God of the universe really pleased at that? (p. 266). 

This is at least the second time that Loftus has brought this up in his book. Scripture repeatedly states that God disapproved of such acts as abominable, evil, and wicked. It couldn’t be more clear and definite than it is. But since Loftus can’t trouble himself to discover that, I’ve collected the passages in my paper on the topic: for folks who are actually willing to give the Bible and God a fair shake (rather than cherry-pick what merely appears to support his case, and ignoring passages that don’t.

The prophet Jeremiah did not like some of the scribes, so God told him [cites Jeremiah 8:7-9]:

Jeremiah 8:7b-9a  (RSV) . . . my people know not the ordinance of the LORD. [8] “How can you say, `We are wise, and the law of the LORD is with us’? But, behold, the false pen of the scribes has made it into a lie. [9] The wise men shall be put to shame, they shall be dismayed and taken; . . . 

What did God just say to Jeremiah? He said lying scribes have falsely altered the law and that there are lies in it! Jeremiah even denies God instituted the priestly sacrificial system. God says through him [he cites Jeremiah 7:22-23, omitting the first part of 7:22, which I include]:

Jeremiah 7:22-23 For in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, I did not speak to your fathers or command them concerning burnt offerings and sacrifices. [23] But this command I gave them, ‘Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people; and walk in all the way that I command you, that it may be well with you.’

. . . Jeremiah “denies categorically that a command to offer sacrifice was part of the divine law at all,” [he cited Burton Scott Easton] even though in the book of Leviticus, Moses supposedly gave detailed instruction about who were to offer sacrifices, where they were to do so, and how. (p. 300)

Concerning Jeremiah 8:7-9, Pulpit Commentary explains:

Jeremiah is evidently addressing the priests and the prophets, whom he so constantly described as among the chief causes of Judah’s ruin (comp. Ver. 10; Jeremiah 2:8, 26; Jeremiah 4:9; Jeremiah 5:31), and who, in Isaiah’s day, regarded it as an unwarrantable assumption on the part of that prophet to pretend to instruct them in their duty (Isaiah 28:9). The law of the Lord is with us. “With us;” i.e. in our hands and mouths. (comp. Psalm 1:16). The word torah, commonly rendered” Law,” is ambiguous, and a difference of opinion as to the meaning of this verse is inevitable. Some think these self-styled “wise” men reject Jeremiah’s counsels on the ground that they already have the divinely given Law in a written form (comp. Romans 2:17-20), and that the Divine revelation is complete. Others that torah here, as often elsewhere in the prophets (e.g. Isaiah 1:10; Isaiah 8:16; Isaiah 42:4), simply means “instruction,” or “direction,” and describes the authoritative counsel given orally by the priests (Deuteronomy 17:11) and prophets to those who consulted them on points of ritual and practice respectively. The usage of Jeremiah himself favors the latter view (see Jeremiah 2:8; Jeremiah 18:18; and especially Jeremiah 26:4, 5, where “to walk in my Torah” is parallel to “to hearken to the words of my servants the prophets.” The context equally points in this direction. The most natural interpretation, then, is this: The opponents of Jeremiah bade him keep his exhortations to himself, seeing that they themselves were wise and the divinely appointed teachers of the people. To this Jeremiah replies, not (as the Authorized Version renders) Lo, certainly in vain made he it, etc.; but, Yea, behold I for a lie hath it wrought – the lying pen of the scribes (so Authorized Version, margin).

Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers concurs:

The meaning of the clause is clear. The sophistry of men was turning the truth of God into a lie, and emptying it of its noblest meaning. Already, as in other things, so here, in his protest against the teaching of the scribes, with their traditional and misleading casuistry, Jeremiah appears as foreshadowing the prophet of Nazareth (Matthew 5:20-48; Matthew 23:2-26).

The phrase “made it into a lie: is, I think, obviously, referring to a corruption or distortion of a teaching or practice which was itself good. Hence, later Jesus cites the same Jeremiah with regard to corruption of temple worship:

Luke 19:46 “It is written, ‘My house shall be a house of prayer’; but you have made it a den of robbers.”

Jeremiah condemned this very thing elsewhere:

Jeremiah 2:8 The priests did not say, ‘Where is the LORD?’ Those who handle the law did not know me; the rulers transgressed against me; the prophets prophesied by Ba’al, and went after things that do not profit.

As to Jeremiah 7:22-23, Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers states:

The words seem at first hard to reconcile with the multiplied rules as to sacrifices both in Exodus and Leviticus. They are, however, rightly understood, strictly in harmony with the facts. They were not the end contemplated. The first promulgation of the Law, the basis of the covenant with Israel, contemplated a spiritual, ethical religion, of which the basis was found in the ten great Words, or commandments, of Exodus 20. . . . The book of Deuteronomy, representing the higher truth from which Moses started (Exodus 19:5), and upon which he at last fell back, bore its witness to the original purport of the Law (Deuteronomy 6:3; Deuteronomy 10:12). Its re-discovery under Josiah left, here as elsewhere, its impress on the mind of Jeremiah; but prophets, as in 1Samuel 15:22; Hosea 6:6; Hosea 8:11-13; Amos 5:21-27; Micah 6:6-8; Psalms 50, 51, had all along borne a like witness, even while recognising to the full the fact and the importance of a sacrificial ritual.

In other passages, Jeremiah is clearly fully supportive of the sacrifices of the Mosaic Law, including the priestly function (i.e., those who ritually offered the sacrifices:

Jeremiah 17:26 And people shall come from the cities of Judah and the places round about Jerusalem, from the land of Benjamin, from the Shephe’lah, from the hill country, and from the Negeb, bringing burnt offerings and sacrifices, cereal offerings and frankincense, and bringing thank offerings to the house of the LORD.

Jeremiah 33:18 and the Levitical priests shall never lack a man in my presence to offer burnt offerings, to burn cereal offerings, and to make sacrifices for ever. . . . [21] then also my covenant with David my servant may be broken, so that he shall not have a son to reign on his throne, and my covenant with the Levitical priests my ministers. [22] As the host of heaven cannot be numbered and the sands of the sea cannot be measured, so I will multiply the descendants of David my servant, and the Levitical priests who minister to me.”

Thus, our task is to interpret and understand Jeremiah 7:22-23 (which appears prima facie at odds) in harmony with those. It’s the biblical hermeneutical principle of “interpret less clear verses by more clear related passages.”

And this is pretty easy to do, simply by reading the progression of events whereby God delivered the law to Moses, and he delivered it in turn to the Hebrews:

Exodus 19:1-8 On the third new moon after the people of Israel had gone forth out of the land of Egypt, on that day they came into the wilderness of Sinai. [2] And when they set out from Reph’idim and came into the wilderness of Sinai, they encamped in the wilderness; and there Israel encamped before the mountain. [3] And Moses went up to God, and the LORD called to him out of the mountain, saying, “Thus you shall say to the house of Jacob, and tell the people of Israel: [4] You have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. [5] Now therefore, if you will obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my own possession among all peoples; for all the earth is mine, [6] and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. These are the words which you shall speak to the children of Israel.” [7] So Moses came and called the elders of the people, and set before them all these words which the LORD had commanded him. [8] And all the people answered together and said, “All that the LORD has spoken we will do.” And Moses reported the words of the people to the LORD.

Note a few things about this. First of all, Jeremiah was citing by paraphrase (which was perfectly acceptable in ancient Hebrew culture), part of this passage:

Exodus 19:3, 5-6 . . . and the LORD called to him out of the mountain, saying, “Thus you shall say to the house of Jacob, and tell the people of Israel: . . . [5] Now therefore, if you will obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my own possession among all peoples; for all the earth is mine, [6] and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. . . .” 

Jeremiah 7:23 But this command I gave them, ‘Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people; and walk in all the way that I command you, that it may be well with you.’

 

The second thing to note is the timing. This was before the law was delivered; even before the Ten Commandments were received. Therefore, it was before the time that God instructed the Hebrews through Moses, of the sacrificial system and laws. Hence, Jeremiah (far from denying anything in and of this whole process) accurately describes this particular moment in salvation history: “For in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, I did not speak to your fathers or command them concerning burnt offerings and sacrifices” (7:22).

The command described in Exodus and reiterated by Jeremiah was chronologically prior to the sacrificial commands (part of the overall Law). God gave Moses the Ten Commandments two days later (see Ex 19:10-12 ff.). The Ten Commandments themselves (Ex 20:3-17) did not contain anything about sacrifices. But God introduced it at the same time he gave Moses the Commandments:

Exodus 20:24  An altar of earth you shall make for me and sacrifice on it your burnt offerings and your peace offerings, your sheep and your oxen; in every place where I cause my name to be remembered I will come to you and bless you.

Again, this was two days after the simpler and broad ethical commandment that Jeremiah cites from Exodus in Jeremiah 7:23. It’s all explained by consulting the text in Exodus which Jeremiah cited. Once one does that , the supposed “problem” vanishes. Meanwhile, as Moses was on Mt. Sinai communicating with God, the people below decided to make an idolatrous golden calf (Ex 32:1-8). Moses’ “anger grew hot”, and he “threw the tables out of his hands and broke them at the foot of the mountain” (Ex 32:19). Thus, the people still hadn’t heard even the Ten Commandments, let alone the sacrificial instructions. But they had heard the “pre-sacrificial” command that Jeremiah referred to (Ex 19:7-8, above).

Later, the text informs us that Moses made two new tablets for the Ten Commandments and went up on Mt Sinai again (Ex 34:1-4), where he communed with God for forty days and nights (34:28), and then communicated with the people, the Law that he had received from God (which included the sacrifices: Ex 34:32; 35:1). So where’s the beef?

Once again, context (mostly, simply reading the relevant passages involved) demolishes the “higher critical” anti-scriptural bloviations of the former Christian atheists, who seem constitutionally unable to comprehend and practice simple cross-referencing and consideration of textual context. It’s embarrassing to have to point this out 7,167 times. But such is one of the repetitive tasks of the apologist, in correcting folks who “will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own likings” (2 Tim 4:3).

I’m honored and privileged to have the opportunity to defend God’s inspired revelation, the Bible, over against those who seek to savage it without cause or reason.

***

Photo credit: Jeremiah on the ruins of Jerusalem (1844), by Horace Vernet (1789-1863) [public domain / Wikimedia Commons]

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April 13, 2022

April 13, 2022 By

This exchange took place in the combox of my article, Jesus’ Last Words: Biblical “Contradictions”? (4-8-21). Words of JohnMC (atheist?) will be in blue.

*****

I think it is right to point out that it is not unreasonable to expect texts regarded as holy and revealed to show consistency. Even minor inconsistencies invite scepticism because of the rigorous claims made for the significance of the texts.

I fully agree, which is why I have largely devoted my writing and research over the last two-three years to answering precisely these objections (as well as establishing a positive support of Scripture from archaeology, which will be the subject of my next “officially published” book). A full listing of those efforts can be found in my collection, “Armstrong’s Refutations of Alleged Biblical ‘Contradictions'”.

These efforts include scores and scores of systematic replies to atheists who specialize in trying to attack the Bible and its alleged massive self-contradictions. Some never reply to my counter-replies to their claims (Bob Seidensticker, Dr. David Madison, John Loftus, Bart Ehrman, Richard Carrier, and more). Others do occasionally (and kudos to them for doing so), but (frankly) not very well when they do (Jonathan M.S. Pearce).

Let me ask you (since you ask me so many questions): if these atheists’ arguments are so compelling, why don’ they prove it and blow my counter-replies out of the water? But they don’t. They prefer to almost always ignore them. They say it’s because I am an ignoramus, imbecile, and idiot (always easy to say). I say it is because they have a lousy case and are intellectual cowards.

I hope that this dealing with “contradictions” will be the topic of my next book (if a publisher wants it), after my next on archaeology is published.

The application of standard reasoning and principles of reliability to historical documents are fine by me

Yeah, me too.

but they are being applied to documents that are claimed to have divine sanction.

We apply reason and intelligence to biblical interpretation, just as we do to any other topic or extensive set of writings like the Bible. That’s what apologetics (my field) is about: applying reason to theology.

Why do we even need to apply human reasoning to their comprehension, and why might a simple claimed error of interpretation lead anyone into misconstruing divine writ?

Because we have to reason in order to properly understand theological documents that are all are 1920 or more years old, written in different languages (including hundreds of non-literal idioms and metaphors, etc.), and produced by a vastly different culture from our present one. That’s not even arguable. It’s self-evident.

The problem with the routine lists of atheist or skeptics’ “contradictions” is that they are so terribly weak, pathetic, and 90% of the time (or more!) clearly not even contradictions in the first place. It’s not so much that the Bible is difficult to understand (although parts of it certainly are: particularly portions of Paul’s letters), but that the skeptics who approach the Bible like a butcher approaches a hog are so 1) abominably ignorant of the Bible’s contents and interpretation, and 2) seem to have never familiarized themselves with classical logic or a textbook of logic. [in case you are wondering, I did take logic in college]

Some inconsistencies may not be contradictions but represent ambivalences that cannot be batted away.

Well, then, since all these big shot / big name atheists almost always ignore my replies, perhaps you will show the courage of your convictions and take up some of them? We agree on the premises (that it’s worthwhile to have those discussions). You seem to be capable. Have at it! I gave you the list of all my defenses.

You see how I have replied to you here, as I always do if an inquiry has substance. You didn’t immediately insult my honesty, as C Nault did [“Your response is the standard playing with what the Bible actually says and twisting it to suit your personal interpretation”: in the same combox]. So I responded quite differently and at length.

Then there are the fully-fledged contradictions and ambiguities and obscurenesses. And then we see the self-referential legitimating arguments. A biblical statement of belief for example the Trinity does [not] become true because it is repeated.

Of course not (just like anything else). The Trinity comes from revelation and cannot be understood from a logic-alone / rationalistic perspective. It is an exceedingly subtle doctrine and requires faith. No Christian has ever denied that. What I focus on is to prove that the Bible teaches it in the first place (many atheists deny this), and why Christians believe that the Bible does so.

Evidence of consistency of belief is not evidence of truth of belief.

Strictly speaking, no. It’s evidence of a lack of contradictoriness, which is the bare minimum. But a consistent showing from the Bible that alleged contradictions are in fact not so (which I have done myself, and many other apologists have done), does, by a cumulative effect, tend to support the notion of biblical inspiration. Consistency doesn’t prove biblical inspiration (which is also a matter of faith), but it’s consistent with it; whereas massive contradictions actually proven are inconsistent with inspiration.

The latter is why I think it is important to deal with these sorts of charges, because it’s important to defend inspiration (indirectly) from reason. We need to “defeat the defeaters” and show how very weak they are.

Few things bolster my Christian faith more than dealing with the alleged “contradictions”: because the arguments are so abominable and laughable that we see the Christian faith as far more rational and sensible. Observing (while I am making my own arguments) the Bible being able to withstand all attacks is incredibly, joyfully faith-boosting. It’s the unique blessing we apologists receive for our efforts.

Statements of miraculous happenings are not proved because there are a lot of them. If extravagant claims are made for the absolute value of scripture, why is it so easy wonder if the texts do not actually just display the predictable raggedness of human ones?

I say they can withstand all the accusations thrown out them, and prove it by my own work. If you disagree, as I said, start sending me counter-counter-replies to my counter-replies, since virtually all of the folks I have replied to refuse to do so (most with rank insults sent my way, too).

Thanks for the serious, non-insulting interaction and have a great day.

[if JohnMC replies, I will add his words to this paper with my further replies]

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Photo credit: Fotografie-Link [public domain / PxHere.com]

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Summary: Good discussion about the nature of alleged Bible “contradictions” in which I explain the rationale for my recently devoting so much time and energy to solving them.

 

February 15, 2021

February 15, 2021 By

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I want you and your adherents to know that I am not . . . so faint-hearted as to be disturbed by your insults. But the fact that you are so disparaging, derogatory, and utterly contemptuous towards my Discussion argues that it is not as contemptible as you make out. If it did not bear down on you, your pen would not have produced such outrageous insults to its author.

[Y]ou are so impudent in your insults . . . so unrestrained in your abuse when you are hemmed in by arguments, that no one, even if he bent over backwards to be fair to you, could find any excuses for your spirit. (Erasmus responding to Martin Luther, Hyperaspistes [1526], pp. 103, 140 in Vol. 76 in Collected Works [1999] )

Matthew 5:11-12 (RSV) Blessed are you when men revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so men persecuted the prophets who were before you.

Matthew 10:22, 25 and you will be hated by all for my name’s sake. . . . [25] . . . If they have called the master of the house Be-el’zebul, how much more will they malign those of his household.

Man, this was tough to narrow down to a mere ten, but I thought I’d have some fun with it. At bottom, however, it is very serious, since it is sin (see my final remarks).

***

10. Steve Skojec [radical Catholic reactionary and former webmaster of One Vader Five]

I’d characterize you as an arrogant bloviator with a penchant for TL;DR diatribes . . . I do believe, though, that you’ve helped people over the years. I have friends who benefited from you during their conversions before they realized what a self-parody you have become. They find it sad that you’re so far from who they thought you were. . . . at the present moment, you’re doing more harm than good with your name-calling and your absurd denials of the truth in front of your face, and that’s why you’re just not taken seriously by many people now. Trying to debate with you about anything is an exercise in futility – not because of your skill as a rhetorician, but because you simply are unable to conceive of any scenario where you aren’t the triumphalistic victor. . . . We’re trying to do work here that matters, and we don’t have time for playground fights.
[5-26-16]

Personally, I’ve found you ridiculous from the moment I first ran into you. You’re a modern day, post-conciliar Don Quixote, all bravado and sword swinging, invariably picking the wrong targets. . . . here you are, sword as dull as ever, energy for a thousand battles, none of them worthwhile. . . . you’ve been wrong as long as I’ve ever come across anything you’ve written about anything that matters, and history will judge you to have been on the wrong side of the schism that is even now coming to a head. It’s a thing, I think, with Protestant converts. They don’t have sola scriptura anymore, so they resort to papal positivism as their one and only guide. Is the current pope saying something that’s an almost complete contradiction of one of his predecessors? No problem! Like Muslims have the theological principle of abrogation, we have Super-Ultramontanism! . . . we have a bad pope (and a run of Modernist-influenced ones before him) and are still reeling from a bad council and a bad Mass means having to deal with an uncomfortable level of cognitive dissonance. . . . You could be a part of the solution if you want, but only if you stop making it about you and start making it about the truth. . . . I feel bad for you, I really do. Someone was calling you the Napoleon Dynamite of Catholic Apologetics, but really, you’re the Uncle Rico. You just keep fantasizing, 20 years on, about what would have happened if coach had just put you in fourth quarter. You keep telling people that you can throw a football over the mountains from your front porch. But coach didn’t put you in, and you can’t throw that far, and the only thing that matters right now is if you fight the evil that is, at this very moment, threatening to strangle the faith of millions of Catholics because it is being perpetrated from the very top. [5-28-16]

It’s all about you. All hubris, all the time. . . . of course, you pulled your trademark move of twisting whatever the other person says to fit your narrative. You’re not just predictable, you’re on rails. Get over yourself, Dave. You’re not even a little deal. And you are doing more harm than good. [5-28-16]

I like the folksy style and Steve’s way with words, and wanted to preserve it. No one I’ve seen in the present era can insult with the sheer derision and contempt in the way that Steve does. But I pity him and think I understand. He barely has any [Catholic] faith anymore, absolutely hates Vatican II, and has virtually asserted that the Church and Pope Francis have entered into heresy, which is contrary to the Catholic dogma of the indefectibility of the Church and of the pope. Pray for the man. He is in very deep spiritual trouble and could very well end up an atheist if he doesn’t change his dangerous trajectory soon.

***

9. John Loftus [prominent online atheist author and webmaster]

You’re a joke. I’m surprised you have an audience. You’re also a psychologist, eh? Wow! . . . Again, you’re a joke. To think you could pompously proclaim you are better than me is beyond me when you don’t know me. It’s a defensive mechanism you have with people like me. It’s called respecting people as people, and Dave’s Christianity does not do that with people who don’t agree with him. I’m just tired of pompous asses on the internet who go around claiming they are superior to me in terms of intelligence and faith. Such arrogance makes me vomit. . . . self-assured arrogant idiots out there, like Dave, who prefer to proclaim off of my personal experience that they are better than I. (10-16-06)

You are an idiot! You never critiqued my whole deconversion story. Deconversion stories are piecemeal. They cannot give a full explanation for why someone left the faith. They only give hints at why they left the faith. It requires writing a whole book about why someone left the faith to understand why they did, and few people do that. I did. If you truly want to critique my deconversion story then critique my book. Other than that, you can critique a few brief paragraphs or a brief testimony, if you want to, but that says very little about why someone left the faith. You walk away thinking you have completely analysed someone’s story. But from where I sit, that’s just stupid. That’s S-T-U-P-I-D! If you truly want to critique a deconversion story, then critique mine in my book. I wrote a complete story there. . . . Dave, I can only tolerate stupidity so long. I challenge you to really critique the one deconversion story that has been published in a book. It’s a complete story. A whole story. It’s mine. . . . Do you accept my challenge? (10-16-06)

John was rather displeased because I critiqued his “deconversion” story and showed, I think, that his reasons for rejecting Christianity were woefully inadequate and at places downright silly or ignorant. At first, I refused to take up his challenge, because I wanted him to d=send me a PDF copy of his book (traded for several of mine), and he refused. But in September 2019 I bought a paper copy of his book and took up the challenge, writing ten in-depth critiques of it. And guess what? Surprise! He has utterly ignored all ten.

***

8. Dr. Eric Svendsen [anti-Catholic Protestant author and former webmaster]

[T]here are not that many of us who take Armstrong’s writings seriously . . . his writings are little more than a bunch of words that have been loosely strung together). (1-3-05)

. . . strategy of deceit that he [yours truly] uses all the time . . . (1-11-05)
*
[T]he “nature” of his apology was insincerity . . . That’s the “strategy of deceit” that Paul refers to in Ephesians 4. (1-13-05)
*
He has no problem with lying, so long as he thinks he can pin that same charge on someone else; that way he doesn’t “appear” to be lying. What a sad spectacle. (1-14-05)

*

What’s my “lack of charity” got to do with DA’s lack of honesty? Nothing. . . . that’s just what DA does best–he deceives, and he usually accomplishes that by focusing on half-truths (that’s the “strategy of deceit” that marks the heretic). (1-15-05)

Eric has been known on several occasions to declare that some unfortunate is definitely damned to the fires of hell. But I suppose that if he thinks I am a heretic, I am already consigned to the reprobate in his fertile discerning mind. He was one of the more colorful and active anti-Catholic polemicists online, in the early 2000s. Then he decided to leave the Internet in April 2010 (I did a fond remembrance post) and has never been heard of since (to my knowledge). I’d like to think that he came to his senses (at least to some extent).

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7. Gene M. Bridges [anti-Catholic Protestant] (10-25-07)

[Y]ou are a chronic liar . . . shoddy, incompetent, and anachronistic exegetical work. . . . Titus 3 says to reject the factious man. You are the epitome of that man. . . . Further, this isn’t about the truth for you Dave, however defined, it’s about stroking your own overbloated ego. . . . a person of such obviously low character . . .

I’m surprised (and a bit disappointed) that Gene didn’t consign me to hell, or at least to the insane asylum . . . this could have been so much better! But to be fair, in the same post, he consistently compared me to the Korean dictator (i.e., the father of the present one), complete with pictures. That’s pretty good, too!

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6. “Turretinfan” [anti-Catholic Protestant Calvinist and blogmaster]

Dave . . . is a self-appointed e-poligist [sic] and largely self-published author. [I have had eleven books “officially” published, by six major publishers: four of them bestsellers, and ten additional ones by FaithLife / Logos: the largest Christian electronic publisher; I also have several Imprimaturs] . . . not all of his doctrines are Catholic . . . Dave has apparently never defined Christianity. . . . Maybe Dave will actually stand behind the dogmatic declarations of the church for which he is allegedly an apologist. (10-29-07)

[Y]ou’re not really in line with orthodox Roman Catholic teaching, Dave. (7-6-09)
*
You are as kind as you are wise or honest. (8-21-09)
*
I’ve recently commented on your lack of integrity. It seems this is going to be an ongoing trend for you. (8-21-09)
*
[Y]our agenda is more important to you than the truth. (8-21-09)
*
This particularly obnoxious fool is so obsessed with his anonymity that he actually has appeared in live debates with Catholics with a bag over his head (looking like either a Klansman or a kid at Halloween with a lousy costume). I’ve noted and/or refuted several of his ridiculous opinions, such as that God wanting men to sin, and statues of Jesus Christ being idols.
*
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5. James Swan [anti-Catholic Protestant polemicist and webmaster]

I’m not the one publishing books and attempting to define my very being as an “apologist.” If these men wish to be taken seriously, I suggest they do serious work. . . . [He] craves attention. (12-22-07)

*
This is a big difference between DA and I. I’ve never been bored. I actually have a job, . . . On the other hand, I think DA considers sitting up in his attic tapping away on a computer all day an actual job. Oh that’s right, he’s a professional Catholic apologist. (7-17-09)
*
I think it’s quite possible you have serious psychological issues. . . . your cyber-behavior strikes me (and probably others) as very bizarre. If you get yourself checked out, and my suspicions prove accurate, and you get the help you need, be it medication or therapy, and we see a change in your cyber behavior, . . . I don’t want to be known as a guy who picked on a person struggling with deep psychological issues. . . . (8-24-09)
*
[P]erhaps it is time we back of from Dave Armstrong a bit. I know you probably think I’m being sarcastic, but actually, I’m not. . . . There’s just something not right with Mr. Armstrong. I think he needs some help. (8-26-09)
*
Yes indeed, I do find your shenanigans quite odd behavior. . . . I think you’re wacky, . . . your eratic [sic] behavior, particularly on my blog, lead[sic]  me to question whether or not you needed help. (2-27-10)
*
Part of looking over your “work” and commenting on it is nothing else than showing why you shouldn’t be taken seriously. (4-18-10)
*
This guy’s a real piece of work. I don’t say that he’s nuts, as he says about me, but I do say (from long sad experience over 18 years) that he is a first-class fool and inveterate liar: at least when it comes to anything to do with me. He was at least somewhat cordial in the beginning of our interactions (as much as an anti-Catholic bigot can be with a Catholic), but what put him over the edge was foolish pride: after (in June 2003) I roundly refuted his second hit-piece about my Luther research that he had worked so hard on (with 201 footnotes, no less!). It probably took him several weeks to write; took me just a few hours to refute. That blow to his ego was just too much to take, and so he has “replied” ever since with the asinine juvenile insults we see above. Bitterness and jealousy drive many many people to serious sin.
*
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4. Mary Hammond [liberal Catholic]

I put forth to you right now that Dave Armstrong, without regard to who trained the ass, educated the ass, is a reflection of exactly what’s wrong with the Catholic Church in America today. If you want to know why it’s split and disfunctional [sic] as a unifying force? Look at Dave. He is the spitting image. . . . Dave Armstrong- you as a heart- aren’t worth the Tomahawk payload to blow you to hell. . . . And if I was your wife I’d divorce you. For being a prissy phony.

*
[Mary reminds me of a funny saying from Winston Churchill. Some woman who didn’t like him much said, “Sir, if I were your wife, I’d put poison in your tea.” The great man replied, “Madame, if you were my wife, I’d drink it.”]
*
. . . You are in this for the money. Not me. Peace out. You are off the rails and too egotistical to know who your friends are. . . . My daughter married such a nightmare. . . . I think if I were you I’d spend sometime wondering who the hell I was before God. Trembling before him certainly is not in your line. . . . what he sorely lacks for as an apologist is love- either for people or the Church. Can’t quite leave his Protestantism behind. . . . A sad sad case Dave is. No love. . . . There is no love, no peace, no charity on your page or in you. You abuse anyone who disagrees with you. And apparently your no does not mean no and your yes does not mean yes. . . . Still waiting for some Catholic apologetics. . . . I also venture to say that one of the more truly toxic forms of Catholicism are with those who convert yet never truly leave their Protestant home. They are neither one or t’other. . . . Not only are you an idiot, but unethical, a bulky and a liar. . . . You are just amazingly STUPID. It boggles the mind anyone reads you at all. . . . It’s time you got a real job man. . . . I have no intention of reading apologetics from a guy who acts premenopausal.. . . This is all you’ve got. Gossip, . . ., slander, calumny, insults and screenshots. Stop blaming the Church by calling this pig tripe of yours “apologetics”. . . . Armstrong just has no credibility left. . . . An apologist? The man is a joke.  . . . complete dishonesty . . . Very dishonest and completely unaware of his own prejudices. . . . It’s hard to decide what is worse. Dave Armstrong or his supporters. (April 2017 on my own Facebook page]
*
Mary would derive huge benefit from a reading of Proverbs. But of course she wouldn’t apply the “fool” verses to herself:

Proverbs 18:2 (RSV) A fool takes no pleasure in understanding, but only in expressing his opinion.

Proverbs 18:7 A fool’s mouth is his ruin, and his lips are a snare to himself.

Proverbs 15:2 The tongue of the wise dispenses knowledge, but the mouths of fools pour out folly.

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3. The late Steve Hays [anti-Catholic Protestant webmaster and polemicist]

[G]uys like Dave Armstrong . . . present an artificially Evangelicalized version of Roman Catholicism . . . sterile hybrid theology that isn’t consistently Catholic or Protestant. (9-14-06)

*
I used to think that Dave Armstrong was just a jerk. Not deeply evil. Just a jerk. . . . He isn’t just a narcissistic little jerk. He’s actually evil. It’s not something we can spoof or satirize anymore. He’s crossed a line of no return. (4-13-09)
*
[H]ypersensitive, paranoid, an ego-maniac, narcissistic, with a martyr and persecution complex, . . . a self-obsessive individual . . . Not only is Dave an idolater, but a self-idolater. He has sculpted an idol in his own, precious image. A singular, autobiographical personality cult. (7-16-09)
*
You have to wonder what Armstrong would do with himself in heaven. I don’t think heaven is big enough for God Almighty and David Armstrong. If Armstrong ever gets to heaven, he’ll have to evict the Lord to make room for himself. Dave is his very own religion. Both subject and object. He carries around a mental icon of his adorable self-image. Lights imaginary candles to his self-image. Burns imaginary incense to his self-image.
*
This overweening self-importance isn’t limited to Armstrong. In my observation, it’s fairly characteristic of Catholic converts who become pop apologists. . . . What is it about Catholic converts like Armstrong which selects for this particular mindset? (“The Cult of St. Dave”, 7-16-09)
*
[Y]ou play the innocent victim when someone exposes your chicanery. . . . you’re a hack who pretends to be a professional apologist . . . you don’t do any real research. . . . Dave is a stalwart enemy of the faith. He’s no better than Richard Dawkins or Christopher Hitchens. Just like the militant atheist, his MO is to destroy faith in God’s word to make room for his alternative. (1-28-10)
*
[Y]our persecution complex (btw, you need to have your psychiatrist up the dosage) . . . I didn’t say you were evil in this one instance. You have an evil character. . . . There’s always a clientele for P. T. Barnums like you. . . . I’m supposed to be taken in by your bipolar tactics? (1-29-10)

*

. . . a schizophrenic guy like Armstrong . . . One of Dave’s problems is his lifelong love affair with himself. He reacts to any imagined slight the way a normal man reacts if someone slights his wife or mother or girlfriend. . . . Dave is self-important. . . . If would help Armstrong if, in refuting the allegation that he’s emotionally unhinged, if he didn’t become emotionally unhinged whenever he hears the allegation. . . . because he doesn’t trust in the merit of Christ alone for salvation, Dave has an insatiable need for self-justification. He, like other Catholics, has no peace of mind. . . . Yes, Dave, that’s evil. Pure evil. . . . Of course, that’s symptomatic of Armstrong’s instability. (4-18-10)
*
It’s bad enough to be a narcissist, but when you’re at war with your mirror-image, who’s left to turn to? It’s hard to be Dave Armstrong. Hard to be a bipolar solipsist. (“Split-personality narcissist”, 8-3-11)
*
Both Paul Hoffer and Dave Armstrong are bad men who imagine they are good men. That’s not unusual. Bad men often have a high opinion of their own motives. And Catholicism reinforces that self-deception. (12-7-11)
*

This is seething literal hatred and contempt, in a way that only an anti-Catholic Calvinist applying his own false doctrine of total depravity can express. The problem with supposedly “determining” who is of the elect or not (which means also who is going to hell) is that the Bible never sanctions doing any such thing (and even John Calvin agreed). But once a person goes down that road and doesn’t like someone else or his or her ideas, the danger is that they will decide that they are scumbags, judged by God and on the way to hell. This in turn justifies any outrages and slanders heaped upon the object of derision. It’s as far away from the love of Jesus and the fruit of the Holy Spirit as can be imagined. I don’t thereby conclude that the one committing such sins is not a Christian. But I do know for sure that such inveterate lying puts them in serious spiritual danger. I sincerely pray that Steve was saved when he passed in the last year. I know that God does everything in His mercy to save as many as possible, given human free will and sin.

***

2. The Right Reverend Bishop “Dr.” [???] James White [anti-Catholic Reformed Baptist Apologist, Elder, Author, famous debater, with a supposed PhD, etc., etc.]

DA lacks the ability to engage the text of the Scriptures in a meaningful fashion, and 2) DA will use anything to attack the truth. . . . As to the first, I simply direct anyone to the “exegesis” presented in A Biblical Defense of Catholicism, his 2001 publication. The book is a monument to how to ignore context, avoid grammar, shred syntax, and insert the traditions of Rome willy-nilly into any passage you cite. . . . DA thinks himself a modern Socrates, yet, his writing takes wild leaps from topic to topic, inserts endless (and often gratuitous) irrelevant material that serves only to cover the shallow nature of what is being said, and in the end requires one to possess the skill of nailing jello to a wall to be able to respond to it for its utter lack of substance.  (3-28-04)

*

[I]f you read his materials, he’s very very high on himself and, uh, makes sure that you know how many books he’s written. Of course, they’re vanity published,

[at this point in time — April 2004 — I had two books published, by two different Catholic publishers: one the largest one: OSV; both bestsellers]

but how many books he’s written, and uh, you read the top of his page, and it’s [mocking tone] exegesis and history and apologetics and philosophy and all this stuff, and you know, in your heart of hearts, that this fella, uh, bless his soul, has no idea what he’s talking about. He’s read some books, but the important foundational stuff that allows you to actually make sense out of all that stuff, he’s clueless; he has no idea what he is talking about, but he writes constantly!

. . . Cuz, it’s sorta, sort of; it’s really disturbing to me, uh, that I hear from people, and they go, “well, well, whaddya think about what he said about this?” And I sorta, I sorta; I, it’s really hard for me to go, “well, have you really thought about, you know, the foundation of this argument, and the background of this argument?” People need to learn how to examine argumentation! And see through fluff! Uh, see through stuff that shouldn’t even be called an argument; it’s complimenting it way too much to call it an argument! And [sigh] it’s just, how do you deal with folks like that? . . .

When you respond to him, and I don’t know if anyone followed it, if they went to his blog — we provided some of the links and stuff — but, I went through, I provided, I quoted from his book, and then I quoted from the article I had written. And the whole point was to illustrate the difference in exegetical methodology. I have one. He doesn’t. And he doesn’t because he doesn’t know the field. He’s just; he doesn’t know what he’s doing! I mean, that would be like my trying to, to, write to a CPA and criticize uh, an audit that he’s done on a major corporation. I’m not trained in that. I don’t know the terminology. I don’t know the basics, the foundational rules that you’re supposed to do and why you put this in this ledger and why you put that — I don’t know that stuff. It’s not my area, I; you can go to school and learn those things. Uh, but he hasn’t done so.

And so, I just provided as an example. Well, he writes this response which has nothing to do with the text; it has nothing to do with exegesis; it just simply proves my point, but that’s one of the things [mocking me] “see, he just ignores this.” Well, okay, yeah, I did, because it wasn’t worth responding to! I mean, it’s just that bad! So, I did respond to it, after he said I wouldn’t, and so I responded to it, demonstrated that it had no connection with reality whatsoever, it was really really bad, and his response to that was basically to accuse me of attacking him, and all the rest of this stuff, which for him means, I pointed out that he doesn’t know what he is talking about.

When do, where do you draw the line? I mean, it would be so much easier to just ignore all these people, but the problem is, we’re one of those few folks that actually gets out there and we get our hands dirty. We actually take on these, these individuals, and show where the argumentation’s bad, and you’re gonna end up with dirt on your hands, and on your face, when you wallow with some of these folks, and we try to figure out where the line is. This guy [sigh], sadly, there are people who write recommendations of his stuff! I mean, you got Scott Hahn, all these folks, which amazes me. Uh, because you [laughter] look at some of his books, and it’s just like “wow! there’s just no substance here.” It’s just rattle rattle rattle rattle, and quote John Henry Cardinal Newman and that’s the end of the subject. And there’s no meaningful argumentation going on at all.

Where do you draw the line, because eventually, I have to trust that the people who are reading these things, and are concerned about these things can eventually go, “hey, wait a minute, that wasn’t even a response; that’s not even a meaningful argument,” without my having to hold their hand and show that to them. But, sadly, in a postmodern world, where, for a lot of folks, if you can produce a response, and spell it right, that somehow means something. The view of logic, rationality, the ability to examine argumentation; let’s face it, folks, listen to the political dialogue in our nation! There’s not a whole lot of meaningful discussion going on there! And yet you get people all excited; you know, I could play my Howard Dean .wav here, you know. [laughter] It’s just like, “whoah!” People, people look at this kind of stuff and as long as your mouth is moving, somehow you’re making a point! Instead of going, “you know what? That person didn’t answer that question, either!, that person didn’t answer that question, either,” wow! you know, all the rest of that kind of stuff . . . it is, it is, it’s a daily battle as to how to decide what you respond to and what you don’t.

Well, on a much higher level; on a much much much higher level; uh, on a, on an extremely much higherly [sic] level [derisive laughter], . . . (webcast of 4-20-04)

Mr. Armstrong has provided a reading list on his blog. In essence, this means that instead of blaming ignorance for his very shallow misrepresentations of non-Catholic theology and exegesis, we must now assert knowing deception. (12-31-04)

Quite honestly, I just don’t see that he follows an argument really well. . . . A Biblical Defense of Catholicism. This is a self-published book, alright? [At first it was, but it was published by Sophia Institute Press in June 2003: a year and seven months before this screed by Bishop White] There’s no editor in the sense of a Bethany House or something involved with this particular book [really? That would be big news to Todd Aglialoro: currently editor for Catholic Answers] . . . . The man does not know how to do exegesis. It’s a fact. I went through it and demonstrated that. But that book really didn’t have a lot of distribution. [That would be news to Sophia, and is a curious comment, since the book was a bestseller in its field] Well now he’s put one out with Sophia Institute Press. [Yeah, my second one!] Now that’s an actual publisher. And so that means it’s gonna get actual distribution [my 2nd of three bestsellers for them!] . . . so it would be useful to a wider audience to go ahead and respond to some of the arguments that are presented in the book, The Catholic Verses, . . . there is a consistent pattern of eisegetical misunderstanding, and an inability to deal with the text . . . basically, Mr. Armstrong melted down . . . it does not seem that anyone knows what ad hominem argumentation is . . . the reason that Dave Armstrong is doing this is pretty much the same reason that Dave Hunt won’t debate me. He can’t. He can’t . . . the facts are not on Dave Armstrong’s side. He can’t respond! . . . Dave Armstrong has gone into hiding . . . because he can’t respond anymore . . . . . . If you don’t read what the other side is saying, you can’t call yourself an apologist, can you? . . . if it’s right there, and you are writing on the subject of sola Scriptura or against sola Scriptura, and two pages prior to something you do cite, a hole is blown right through your argument, facts are presented that are completely contrary to your own position, and you hide that; you say nothing about it, that’s not honest! That’s not apologetics! I don’t have any respect for that, and I’m gonna point it out! You’re misusing your audience when you do that. Aren’t you? . . . I would rather have had 20 verses that confound Protestants, and had serious arguments presented, than 95 fluffy pieces; 95 fluffy passages. Most of the time, these passages are cited, and there’s no exegesis offered. It’s just, “well here’s what the text says, and my Catholic tradition says this, and therefore we move on from there.” That’s not meaningful argumentation . . . if you’ve been in a serious, Bible-oriented, Bible-preaching church for the past ten years, you should be able to refute clearly and exegetically, at least 90 of these 95 . . . the argumentation is so basic and so clearly fallacious . . . clear, obvious, logical errors . . . Armstrong could throw his hands up in the air and say, “look, I’m not a scholar; I have no scholarly training. [I guess that is why I wrote in the Intro. of this very book (p. xiii): “This is not a scholarly work, as I am no scholar in the first place . . .”] . . . . . . your refutation is actually based upon your own ignorance; you didn’t understand what they were saying . . . . . . If Mr. Armstrong can’t defend his material, then so much the worse for Mr. Armstrong. Maybe he will move on to doing something else. Maybe he’ll recognize this isn’t something he should be doing. Maybe he’ll think twice before putting himself in that situation again. . . . No one has even tried to document that I have misrepresented Dave Armstrong. They can’t. (webcast of 1-4-05)

[I]t truly amazes me that someone who utterly lacks the tools to do the work he claims to do with such expertise continues to be dragged along by the rest of his compatriots. Just another example of “as long as it is in the service of Mother Church, it is all good.” (4-5-05)

Now, moonbat is an interesting phrase. It is generally used to describe the wacko left, but it strikes me as being particularly descriptive of wackos in general, unhinged folks who have no self-control and are utterly controlled by their angry emotions. Most religions have their moonbats. Rome surely does. Off the top of my head, we can list . . . Dave “the Stalker” Armstrong . . . (5-4-07)

Steve Ray and Dave Armstrong, . . . those Roman Catholic apologists who really are not serious about truth but do what they do for less-than-noble reasons, . . . (7-31-08)

The little yip yip yip yip yip dog? That’s Dave Armstrong, because he never does anything original on his own. He always borrows from somebody else. . . . . . . try doing it truthfully. Try presenting both sides; maybe try listening to both sides sometime. You’re not gonna get that kind of example following Dave Armstrong and Jerusalem Jones [Steve Ray], but I call you to a higher standard. (webcast, 7-31-08)

Serious readers in the field realize that while Dave may stumble over a thoughtful argument once in a while, it is always to be found somewhere else. He simply does not produce original argumentation of any kind, and clearly does not understand the responses that have been offered to him over and over again. (1-6-10)

Dave Armstrong is not a Roman Catholic scholar. He trolls the Internet and cobbles stuff together. Worst of the worst. (Twitter, 5-17-12)

Dave Armstrong is not a serious or thoughtful or reflective or studied Roman apologist or writer. Period. (Twitter, 5-17-12)

Dave Armstrong has never had a fresh insight on a theological and doctrinal topic. Period. (Twitter, 5-18-12)

[the hilarious thing about that is that he was replying to Dan Pritchett, who is is Executive Vice President at FaithLife / Logos Bible Software, which publishes eleven of my books!]

Ah, what can one say about the inimitable Bishop White? He has wasted more ink in lying about me since our first postal debate in 1995 (where he was so defeated that he split before the end and has never attempted a serious debate with me since), than any man alive. None of it has had the slightest effect, anymore than it had the slightest truth contained in it (not that this would ever stop him from doing it). He brags endlessly about his skill in oral debates and how every Catholic on the face of the earth is supposedly scared to death of him. Well, I don’t do oral debates, but I did one spontaneous “live chat” with him in his chat room, with no notes (making patristic references off the top of my head), and I thought I did fine (you be the judge).  I have compiled a book of my written “debates with” (er, more like my refutations of) him and have a lengthy web page devoted to His Eminence as well.

Thanks for the memories and laughs, James!
***
1. Shawn McElhinney [Catholic blogger with unfortunate remnants of irrational “can’t see the forest for the trees” modes of thought from his SSPX days ]

Obviously those who have more of an interest in personality clashes and public pissing matches cannot stand this approach; ergo the spectacle Dave sought to create last year on a matter he was (and is) profoundly ignorant and not equipped to discuss correctly. And though I have already dealt with this; the recent public attempts to “airbrush” the record of what happened requires that I set the record straight once and for all.

. . . your claim to want to dialogue was a sham exactly as I said it was. You should have had the decency to have admitted to it publicly rather than try to pretend that you wanted to dialogue. Furthermore, if you never intended to interact with my arguments, then you have NO BASIS WHATSOEVER for crying about how soundly I bitchslapped your crap down publicly after 8/28.

. . . he had no interest in an actual dialogue but instead wanted to turn what was a private discussion on a very theologically complex subject matter into a public spectacle complete with Jerry Springer-esque antics and Michael Moore-like uses of photography for propagandistic purposes.

. . . Dave proved if there was any doubt on the matter about his honesty on these matters that he either had none or that he was sloppy and not bothering to read and consider the arguments debunking his sources. . . .

Dave, you may be able to fool those who hang on your every word as if it came from Mt. Sinai on stone tablets, but people capable of critical discernment and who have even an elementary understanding of how to construct a valid argument will recognize your approach here for what it is worth.

In light of the absolute outhouse compost that he threw together, Dave has a lot of gall referring to “skewed factual data” or “mere aversion.” He has acted as disgracefully as Benedict Arnold in this whole situation and my tolerance for his blatant misrepresentation of my position on this was used up long ago. I was content to let the issue die but with his latest attempt at grandstanding and public sensationalism (and once again violating the private discussion forum to resurrect this subject publicly), I decided enough was enough.

. . . every assertion Dave makes above is a bald faced lie.

And Dave should be ashamed of himself for attempting to pass off such a heap of dung as he has as some kind of “serious scholarship” when in fact, I wrote better and more convincing papers than this offering in junior high school back in the day.

It is frankly embarrassing to see a person with Dave’s gifts act in this fashion but I am not surprised to see it really. That is what happens with those who have either a provincialist approach to issues or an apologetic “must-debate-anything-however-ignorant-I-am-about-the-subject-to-be-discussed”mentality coupled with a predictable and “one-size-fits-all” approach to these matters. And in Dave’s case, it is pretty evident that he has all three of those problems in spades along with perhaps a few others I am not about to go into at the present time.

Now that is fine when you do not have all the facts but I provided them and Dave (if he had any scholastic integrity whatsoever) would recognize this and account for it accordingly. (1-23-06)

This incredibly hostile display of worthless flatulence (and this is only a twentienth of all of it: if that much) all came about as a result of my taking the position that the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were immoral according to Catholic just war ethics. Shawn didn’t like the way I argued. That is his explanation for it. He also contends that ad hominem attacks are justifiable as long as one makes real arguments about the subject matter alongside them; quite curious and dubious ethics, to say the least . . .

Shawn and I had been friends, but in the summer of 2005, that was exploded after I wrote a condemnation of the nuclear bombing of Japan in several articles. Shawn replied with an equally vigorous defense of these immoral acts that have been repeatedly condemned by popes, Vatican II, and many high figures in the Catholic Church.

Originally on my website I had lengthy, comprehensive replies to his attacks, and I made repeated efforts to reconcile, all to no avail. Dr. Art Sippo, a mutual friend and Catholic apologist, who agreed with Shawn’s position on the issue, contended that it was a scandalous disgrace for fellow Catholics to disagree so acrimoniously online, in view of the public. He counseled both of us to remove these materials.

I immediately agreed and removed all reference to Shawn in my articles, while retaining their original substance. Shawn, on the other hand, did not agree, and kept all of his attacks against me online. Every once in a while, I would notice that he softened them a bit here and there; took out or changed a view words, etc., but did not entirely remove them, let alone denounce them, retract, and apologize (either publicly or privately).

Two or three times since 2006 I have cited the worst of these attacks on Facebook, either as part of my article, “Top Ten All-Time Favorite Insults Sent My Way” [i.e., this one, in past versions] or by themselves or in a link. Facebook friend Patti Sheffield (who apparently remains friends with Shawn) appealed to me both times to remove these, saying that Shawn wished me to do so. Both times I complied, so that this was three occasions that I “turned the other cheek” in charity, hoping for a long overdue reconciliation. But the one-way thing is singularly unsuccessful in matters of estrangement. It takes two.

Then, lo and behold, I noticed that Shawn participated (with atheists, liberal Catholics, and apologetics-haters) in a vicious hit-piece thread against me on Mary Pezzulo’s web page, underneath her abominable article, “I Apologize For The Apologist” (10-1-21).

Again, I did not and have not responded to his attacks there. It deserves no response, in any event, and I am banned from Mary’s combox, anyway, even if I wished to respond there. I simply responded to Mary’s outrageous attacks in my article, “Proud Mary Keep On Boinin’ . . .” (10-6-21).

But after four times turning the other cheek, I was fed up with the double-standard hypocrisy and decided to restore his worst attacks against me to my blog again, along with a related reply I made in 2013 to further attacks of his on Facebook (which I had — good ol’ Dave! — removed). And this time I will not remove any of this, save for a full and public retraction and apology.

[see a further reply to his ongoing insults sent my way: Reply to Attacks from Anti-Apologist Shawn McElhinney (8-6-13; rev. 12-6-21)]
***
Please pray for all these poor souls, as I do (and am commanded to do in Scripture). I can only pity persons who have to lie like this about a brother in Christ: even a fellow Catholic, in several cases. I had fun with this (as Erasmus did with Luther’s endless insults; what else can one do with this sort of rotgut?), but at bottom it is a wicked thing and a very serious spiritual problem: to bear false witness against a fellow Christian (or, fellow human being, in the case of atheists and agnostics).
*
May we all be prevented by the Holy Spirit from ever entering this despicable territory. Thus I end what was originally a humorous post — poking fun at the stupidity and sheer ludicrosity of such insults — on a very serious note indeed. Sins may be funny and laughable in their folly and silliness, but they are not in the least bit funny in their effects on the soul of the person who is committing them and failing to repent.
*
***

Photo credit: James White: posted on 14 May 2020 on Twitter [source]

***

[revised on 12-6-21 by restoring Shawn McElhinney to his rightful position at #1]

January 31, 2021

January 31, 2021 By

Atheist and anti-theist Bob Seidensticker runs the influential Cross Examined blog. He asked me there, on 8-11-18: “I’ve got 1000+ posts here attacking your worldview. You just going to let that stand? Or could you present a helpful new perspective that I’ve ignored on one or two of those posts?” He added in June 2017 in a combox: “If I’ve misunderstood the Christian position or Christian arguments, point that out. Show me where I’ve mischaracterized them.” Delighted to oblige his wishes . . .

Bob (for the record) virtually begged and pleaded with me to dialogue with him in May 2018, via email. But by 10-3-18, following massive, childish name-calling attacks against me,  encouraged by Bob on his blog, he banned me from commenting there. I also banned him for violation of my rules for discussion, but (unlike him) provided detailed reasons for why it was justified.

Bob’s cowardly hypocrisy knows no bounds. On 6-30-19, he was chiding someone for something very much like his own behavior: “Spoken like a true weasel trying to run away from a previous argument. You know, you could just say, ‘Let me retract my previous statement of X’ or something like that.” Yeah, Bob could!  He still hasn’t yet uttered one peep in reply to — now — 69 of my critiques of his atrocious reasoning.

Bible-Basher Bob reiterated and rationalized his intellectual cowardice yet again on 12-21-20: “I love people who can make cogent arguments against mine or point out data I hadn’t considered before. What I dislike (and ban) are $#&*%@s who . . . refuse to learn/adapt . . . ignore compelling arguments against their position, and so on.”

Bible-Basher Bob’s words will be in blue. To find these posts, follow this link: “Seidensticker Folly #” or see all of them linked under his own section on my Atheism page.

*****

In his post, “Defending 10 Atheist Arguments (3 of 5)” (1-30-21). Bible-Basher Bob again beats the dead horse of a supposed “henotheism” taught in the Bible. Henotheism is a variant of polytheism (“many gods”), defined as “the worship of a single, overarching god while not denying the existence or possible existence of other lower deities” (Wikipedia). Bob — incredibly — claims that the Bible actually teaches this. I thoroughly corrected and refuted him twice, over two years ago now (I’ll provide those links below), but as we all know, he ignores all critiques from me (can’t be too careful!), and so goes on repeating the same tired, stupid, refuted claims (as if repeating a lie enough times magically makes it true).

In this effort, Bob is opposing Tim Barnett of the Protestant Stand to Reason apologetics ministry. Anyone but me (the one who provides a direct point-by-point rebuttal of his nonsense) . . . Bible-Basher Bob, ever the Bible expert (more than any Christian!) pontificates:

The Bible (at least part of it) imagines a world with multiple gods—not just the Israelites’ Yahweh, but Chemosh, Moloch, Marduk, Baal, and other ancient Mesopotamian deities. And these are (supposedly) real gods—the Bible isn’t saying, “Yahweh obviously exists, but those nutty Moabites worship their invented god Chemosh.” There were multiple choices for a god but no good reason to pick one as preferable over another.

If we’re taking the Bible as true, then these “other gods” were just as real as Yahweh. . . . 

The first Commandment, “You shall have no other gods before me,” doesn’t say that there aren’t other gods or even that they mustn’t be worshipped! It simply says that Yahweh must be the primary god. . . . 

What is clear is that the Bible evolved over time.

The book of Isaiah was written in three parts, and this chapter is in the middle piece, written in the 6th century BCE. It’s true that verse claims God is the only god, but by this time, henotheism had been replaced by monotheism. The Bible evolved.

This claim of “biblical evolution” (in essential aspects, like the nature of God) is poppycock, and I have already refuted it:

Seidensticker Folly #20: An Evolving God in the OT? (God’s Omnipotence, Omniscience, & Omnipresence in Early Bible Books & Ancient Jewish Understanding) [9-18-18]

. . . The Bible itself says that Yahweh is just one of many gods. The Bible documents the evolution of the supernatural from henotheism to monotheism, which shows that Yahweh is no more real than any of the others.

These are all lies, and I have refuted them repeatedly:

Seidensticker Folly #19: Torah & OT Teach Polytheism? [9-18-18]

Loftus Atheist Error #8: Ancient Jews, “Body” of God, & Polytheism [9-10-19]

Do the OT & NT Teach Polytheism or Henotheism? [7-1-20]

The Bible Teaches That Other “Gods” are Imaginary [National Catholic Register, 7-10-20]

Once the Mosaic Law is established, monotheism (one God and one God only) is crystal clear, and remains so throughout the Bible:

Exodus 8:10 (RSV) . . there is no one like the LORD our God. (cf. 1 Chr 17:20; 2 Chr 6:14)

Deuteronomy 4:35, 39 To you it was shown, that you might know that the LORD is God; there is no other besides him. . . . [39] . . . the LORD is God in heaven above and on the earth beneath; there is no other. (cf. Neh 9:6; 2 Sam 7:22; 1 Kgs 8:23; Is 43:10; 44:6, 8; 45:5-6, 14, 18, 21-22; 46:9; 47:8; Hos 13:4)

Deuteronomy 6:4 Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD; (cf. Mk 12:29; Jas 2:19)

Deuteronomy 32:39 See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no god beside me; I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal; and there is none that can deliver out of my hand.

Psalm 83:18 Let them know that thou alone, whose name is the LORD, art the Most High over all the earth.

Psalm 86:10 For thou art great and doest wondrous things, thou alone art God.

Isaiah 37:20 …thou alone art the LORD. (cf. 37:16)

Isaiah 43:10 …Before me no god was formed, nor shall there be any after me.

Isaiah 44:8 …Is there a God besides me? There is no Rock; I know not any. (cf. 44:6; 45:5-6, 21-22; 46:9; Mal 2:10)

And the Bible also explains beyond any doubt that the other “gods” being talked about are not real (only imagined to be by false worshipers). The Bible refers to them in the sense that they exist in other religious belief-systems: not because they exist in fact or reality. Obviously, these sorts of texts are saying that this is all these supposed “gods” are: wood and stone. They have no conscious existence. It’s classic idolatry: that the Jews were judged for again and again throughout the period of the Old Testament:

Genesis 31:19 . . . Rachel stole her father’s household gods.

Genesis 35:2, 4 So Jacob said to his household and to all who were with him, “Put away the foreign gods that are among you, and purify yourselves, and change your garments; . . . [4] So they gave to Jacob all the foreign gods that they had, and the rings that were in their ears; and Jacob hid them under the oak which was near Shechem.

Exodus 20:23 You shall not make gods of silver to be with me, nor shall you make for yourselves gods of gold.

Leviticus 19:4 Do not turn to idols or make for yourselves molten gods: I am the LORD your God.

Deuteronomy 4:27-28 And the LORD will scatter you among the peoples, and you will be left few in number among the nations where the LORD will drive you. [28] And there you will serve gods of wood and stone, the work of men’s hands, that neither see, nor hear, nor eat, nor smell. (cf. 29:17; 1 Chr 16:26; Is 2:8, 20; 31:7; 37:19; 44:10, 15, 17; 46:6; Jer 1:16)

Deuteronomy 28:36 The LORD will bring you, and your king whom you set over you, to a nation that neither you nor your fathers have known; and there you shall serve other gods, of wood and stone. (cf. 28:64: “other gods, of wood and stone”)

Deuteronomy 32:17 They sacrificed to demons which were no gods, . . .

2 Kings 19:15-19 And Hezeki’ah prayed before the LORD, and said: “O LORD the God of Israel, who art enthroned above the cherubim, thou art the God, thou alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth; thou hast made heaven and earth. [16] Incline thy ear, O LORD, and hear; open thy eyes, O LORD, and see; and hear the words of Sennach’erib, which he has sent to mock the living God. [17] Of a truth, O LORD, the kings of Assyria have laid waste the nations and their lands, [18] and have cast their gods into the fire; for they were no gods, but the work of men’s hands, wood and stone; therefore they were destroyed. [19] So now, O LORD our God, save us, I beseech thee, from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that thou, O LORD, art God alone.” (cf. Is 37:19; 45:20)

2 Chronicles 13:9 . . . Whoever comes to consecrate himself with a young bull or seven rams becomes a priest of what are no gods.

Psalm 40:4 . . . those who go astray after false gods!

Psalm 96:5 For all the gods of the peoples are idols; but the LORD made the heavens. (cf. 97:7; 115:4; 135:15)

Isaiah 37:19 …for they were no gods, but the work of men’s hands, wood and stone.…

Isaiah 44:10 Who fashions a god or casts an image, that is profitable for nothing?

Isaiah 44:15 . . . he makes a god and worships it, he makes it a graven image and falls down before it.

Isaiah 44:17 And the rest of it he makes into a god, his idol; and falls down to it and worships it; he prays to it and says, “Deliver me, for thou art my god!”

Isaiah 46:6 Those who lavish gold from the purse, and weigh out silver in the scales, hire a goldsmith, and he makes it into a god;
then they fall down and worship!

Jeremiah 2:11  Has a nation changed its gods, even though they are no gods? . . .

Jeremiah 5:7 . . . Your children have forsaken me, and have sworn by those who are no gods. . . . (cf. 10:14)

Jeremiah 16:20 Can man make for himself gods? Such are no gods! (cf. 51:17)

The New Testament is no different. The existence of these “gods” is denied by St. Paul:

1 Corinthians 8:4-6 Hence, as to the eating of food offered to idols, we know that “an idol has no real existence,” and that “there is no God but one.” [5] For although there may be so-called gods in heaven or on earth — as indeed there are many “gods” and many “lords” — [6] yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.

Galatians 4:8 Formerly, when you did not know God, you were in bondage to beings that by nature are no gods;

Ephesians 4:5-6 one Lord, one faith, one baptism, [6] one God and Father of us all, who is above all and through all and in all.

1 Timothy 2:5 For there is one God, . . .

Some also claim that St. John in the book of Revelation is a henotheist or polytheist. I don’t see how. The book of Revelation never includes the word “gods” a single time. Here’s what it teaches:

Revelation 1:8 “I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.

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Photo credit: God the Father, as typically presented with dramatic license in art (since in the Bible He is a spirit) [Pixabay / Pixabay License]

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