The Antichristian Phenomenon

In this article a few topics converge to the core of what I would call my quarrel with Christianity, its teachings and more importantly: its followers or rather lack thereof. You might think “a lack of following?” and following that remark present me with an estimate of the vast amount of people who identify themselves as Christians, being a big chunk of the global population pie. And that is exactly my point: these people identify themselves as Christians whereas I am speaking of strict followers of Biblical dogma.

I must start with the Old Testament. Anyone who has ever read even part of it will undoubtedly recognize that this collection of books is mostly concerned with he history of the people of Israel. The god found in the Old Testament presents itself as one only concerned with the Israelites. This god completely lacks any sympathy for any other tribe or people and will not hesitate to wipe out any people, city or tribe that are either a threat to his precious, chosen people or who simply piss him off for various petty reasons. It is an angry, tribal god, a boastful bully who enjoys the reek of burnt animals and requires his followers to cut off a part of their penises. Regarding the Israelites themselves, the Old Testament describes how this people was freed from Egyptian slavery and how they consequently, after many a bloody conquest, they established kingdoms (of Judah and Israel). However, these kingdoms were lost after the Israelites were conquered by other peoples, leading the Israelites into Babylonian exile. Of course, this was all the result of disobedience of that wonderful god. However, because the OT god is such a good guy, all hope was not lost, since through Isaiah it was prophesized a king would come who would would restore the kingdom of Israel, rebuild The Temple and other neat things such as reviving the dead and making the OT god the god of all nations and peoples.

This is a very important clash with Christian belief, which is rooted mainly in the New Testament. Jesus did not revive all the dead, nor does the entire world now serve God (look at me!), nor was death abolished since Jesus’ arrival – nay, Jesus even died himself. As the Moshiach (“the Anointed One” who will bring the Messianic age), Jesus utterly fails. Still, Christians swear by him as the Messiah prophesied in the Israelites’ scriptures, even though the Israelites’ themselves disagree (and for good reason). Leaning on the crutch that is the Old Testament, a new dogma developed with Jesus as the center-point. The gospels from the newly formed scriptures claim this Jesus figure spoke of a god of love for everyone; or rather: some new god as it does not match the pattern of our Old Testament friend. Other important theological additions include the concepts of Satan, heaven and hell. All these modifications and additions strike cacophonous chords with the older scriptures, but such seems the nature of Christianity: Reinventing dogma as it goes along. It is this exactly central characteristic that I often find myself entangled in.

To part from the basic level of scriptural discrepancy and move into the realm of Christian theology, we see the aforementioned central characteristic return. There are numerous Christian denominations with varying interpretations of the scriptures and I will concentrate on the prime example: Catholicism. Catholicism stands out among the denominations not just because of its size, but because of its sheer brutality. Over the centuries the Catholic Church made the Judeo-Christian religion into a political machine. This machine has had a firm grip on many powerful nations in the history of the world, with the pope at its head. This political influence brought about extra dogmatic additions and inventions which lead to “holy” wars (and consequential plunderings, one of the factors in the the amassment of the excessive wealth of the Vatican), the Spanish Inquisition, the selling letters of forgiveness “from god”, and so on. One of their more recent dogmatic inventions is papal inerrancy, which as an effect relieves the pope of any responsibility.

The Catholic Church is of course an extreme example of the reinvention of dogma and I am certainly not arguing that this practice will lead to the monstrosities we find in the history of the Catholic Church. To be fair, I will provide you with another example, and it is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints: Mormonism. In addition to the original scriptures this church has the book of Mormon, magically revealed to the church’s founder Joseph Smith, Jr. The book was supposedly translated from golden plates having “unknown characters”, given to Joseph Smith by an angel named Moroni. The plates are, of course, now buried somewhere in the hills near Smith’s house. Mormonism hasn’t lead to anything too disturbing, barring occasional polygamy and the wearing of magical underwear.

You average non-catholic, non-Mormon Christian thinks he has not strayed as far from the Biblical path as those silly Mormons, but nothing less is true. Although they have indeed not built an empire or added any extra books to their precious Bible, they are in fact very unbiblical in just about every aspect of their lives. Most of them simply don’t realise it, because they haven’t actually read the Bible. I have no statistics on this, but time and time again I find myself debating a professed Christian who hasn’t even read “the Holy Book”. I am sure anyone who is active in these kinds of debates have had similar experience. These particular Christians tend to forget that there is a reason why we oppose their religion. It is because we have studied it, through experience and inquiry and have found it not to belong in the world we inhabit this day. Hiding gods whose baseless laws and morality they unverifiably passed to men have no place in modern government. Without actually having read the horrific, inhuman laws found in the New Testament or having realised God’s disgust for us as worthless, sinful mortals you as a self-proclaimed Christian have no right to call “their” God just and loving. These “Christians” have a one-sided conception of the Biblical god. In my experience, especially Christians from largely secular countries have this skewed perspective, and in these countries Christianity has once again reivented its dogma, and a new Christian god is born yet again.

There is but a relative handful of Christians who have actually understood the Bible and its god. A lot of them spend their lifetime trying to piece the biblical puzzle together in such a way that their god can be called loving in the face of his vile deeds – spending their lives studying theology. Some of these Christians write Apologetics, doing just that: thinking of excuses why an all-loving god would do such horrible things – and not to mention finding ways how scripture can be interpreted so that it doesn’t collide with scientific discoveries, but this is largely beside the point. There are also those Christians who do not try to understand the actions of God, but take them for face value. These Christians are abhorred by almost all Christians for giving them a bad image. It is the likes of Fred Phelps and his Westboro Baptist Church I am speaking of. These Christians show a much better understanding of the Bible and God: God does indeed hate homosexuals, God does hate sinners, and God will punish us for eternity in hell after we have died if we escape the apocalypse. It is ironic that their scriptural knowledge is not applauded by fellow Christians, but rather ignored. Ignored, like Christians have ignored so much else: the maturing of human society, our sobering from our superstitious beliefs and our advancement in the knowledge of the world in which the Bliblical God and Biblical doctrine have no place.

The Aristotelian causa efficiens for this article were two recent news articles about two epidemics. A mumps outbreak in Chilliwack, Canada was traced back to a single case in a religious group that was opposed to vaccination. This outbreak has lead to mengingitis, deafness and concerns about sterility in a number of people.^[I]). The same infectious disease broke out in the Netherlands this year, which was the first in twenty years. Even though vaccination coverage for this and other diseases is 90-95% in the Netherlands overall, this outbreak took place in a geographic region with a high percentage of residents who are Christian reformed conservatives.^[II]).

Most reformed conservatives in the Netherlands live in a geographic location aptly called the Bible belt. It has a grim history concerning infectious disease outbreaks and epidemics. In events since the 1957 Dutch vaccination program took off there have been multiple cases of outbreaks in the bible belt, owing to the refusal to vaccinate of these Christian reformed conservatives. Especially in the last 15 years this group of Christians has been drawing attention and deserved criticism to itself. In 1992-1993 there was an outbreak of Polio in this region. In 1999-2000 there was a measles epidemic, which caused the death of three children. In the 2300 cases (of which 20% lead to serious medical complications)^[III]) almost all (97%) affected were not vaccinated because of their religious convictions – or in the case of children, because of their parents’ religious convictions. In 2004-2005, there was an outbreak of rubella. None of the affected were vaccinated, of which 90% because of religious reasons.

The religious reasons are rooted in the idea of “God’s providence” – The idea that every event is intended by God. In this line of reasoning, God will prevent you from getting infectious diseases if it fits his plan. If you do get affected, it must somehow be a necessary evil in God’s grand orchestration of ultimate benevolence. And so you have to ask yourself: Should parents have the freedom to put their child at risk when this is completely unnecessary? To me, this religious practice is no different than medical neglect. In the Netherlands, parents are free to choose not to vaccinate their children on the grounds of religious freedom. I always wonder what happened to the medical rights of the children. Should children’s rights make place for parents’ choices? I think not. It is not a matter of religious freedom because it’s possible harmful consequences are being imposed on others, on the weak and vulnerable – on exactly those who the government should protect.

And there is more to it. There are cases of medical neglect on much higher scales and in much higher political and religious spheres. I think the best known case is the Pope’s rejection of the use of condoms for Africa to stop the spread of HIV and Aids.^[IV]). Think about it: the most influential spiritual leader is opposed to an easy, comparatively cheap and proven method to prevent the human immunodeficiency virus spread in favour of methods that are unrealistic and plainly ineffective (i.e. “abstinence and fidelity”). This is no less than a condemnation to a horrific disease through authoritarian, religious blackmail.

Leaving the global scale, there are other cases of medical neglect. One of which is not so much because of religious opposition, but because of religious substitution. Instead of going to see a doctor, people are being subjected to a cross-carrying quack to undergo “faith healing” (I will only go into the religious forms of this, and not those of homeopathy and its likes). The worst and most despicable forms occur with televangelists. (e.g. Benny Hinn and Peter Popoff). Not only do these people claim to be able to heal the sick, they often earn ridiculous amounts of money through their work as charlatans. Another bad case of medical neglect through religious substitution presents itself as institutionalised to “Christian Science“. Christian Science adherents (“Christian Scientists”, not to be confused with “Christian scientists”!) will rely on the healing power of prayer as a first remedy in the case of illness. Like the case with creationism, they reduce the issue of medical care to a choice in a false dichotomy of modern healthcare versus their spiritual “treatment”. In the Christian Science frequently asked questions section, they justify the endangerment of their children because parents should have the right to choose for the spiritual treatment they themselves have found to be effective.^[V].

In the conclusion of this article I’d like to emphasize on the importance of this problem. Children are medically neglected (thus practically abused) by their religious parents because the law has allowed them to. do so under the moniker of religious freedom. We should not allow this to happen. Therefore,  as a first step, I am in favour of mandatory (government-funded) vaccination programs for children, regardless of parents’ religious beliefs. I encourage people to comment with ways to counteract the religious substitution of healthcare for children.

Footnotes

1. The Province, “Mumps outbreak traced to anti-vaccination religious group”, August 27, 2008 (link [↩]
2. Dutch vaccination institution, “Increased mumps incidence in the Netherlands”, July 3, 2008 (link [↩]
3. National Health Services, MMR The Facts – The Netherlands, (link [↩]
4. BBC News, “Pope rejects condoms for Africa”, June 10, 2005 (link [↩]
5. Propaganda video from Christian Science (link) [↩]

Creative Commons License - Credit: Svadilfari

Religious ideals about sexuality permeate our society to this very day. In the western society it is Christianity which has set our current norms. It may be apparent that things are different on the eastern and African front, where the Islamic religion prevails, but I’ll remain culturally local and only try to shake our own foundations. Normality as we know it is culturally founded on our Christian history, which is a clear invitation to critical inspection. To what extent has Christian doctrine influenced our ideas and perceptions regarding sexuality. Should we accept these, or is it time for a new paradigm?

I think I should start off with sexual education early at school. This is where everybody should come into contact with sexuality for the first time. Unfortunately, sex education is not compulsory in all schools, or even present at all in some countries. This is a shame because I think everybody should be taught some basics about sex and contraception. The worst case scenario is seen in the US, where so-called “abstinence-only sex education” prevails. To me that sounds a lot like a “bookless book club”. The whole idea is a farce and filled with propaganda against contraception. It is this kind of anti-knowledge that frustrates me the most. This is important stuff that shouldn’t be brushed behind the curtain, like it’s something to be ashamed of. Bring out the condoms and dildos already!

And while we’re still talking about teenagers, it’s time we remove the taboo of masturbation. Anyone who says he or she doesn’t do it is a liar, especially if they are in their teenage years. So what has made this topic indiscussable? People are evolutionary wired to like sex, so what is so damn wrong with simulating it? This has close ties with the taboo on pornography, the helping hand for masturbation. The social stigma on this genre is counterproductive in teaching the new generation about sex. Your teachers at school will not be giving examples in sexual education as portrayed in Monty Python’s Meaning of life, but I see absolutely no problem in displaying a pornographic film as part of this education. It’s only the activity that has produced everyone.

The abstinence-only generation is a generation that is geared towards pre-marital chastity simply because they know no different. It’s fine that somebody would choose for this for whatever reasons, but I simply detest the demonisation of sex before – what I perceive as – the empty gesture of marriage. Chastity has made it into the list of virtues, while lust has made it into the list of sins. What’s wrong with liking things that feel good, and what’s so good about not acting upon them? Excepting personal preference, I am truly in the dark about this. In this modern day and age, where we can prevent babies from spawning after having a lovely time with somebody you like, should it matter whether you’re married or not? I can understand the complications of getting a baby if you haven’t settled down with somebody because you are just fooling and experimenting around, but those scenarios are easily preventable nowadays.

So, on to marriage itself! As you’ve noticed, I don’t understand what all the fuss is about. It’s a strange ritual, but I’ll not get into the technicalities of it. The fact remains that marriage is in many countries still a privilege, not a right, for heterosexual couples. I think it is quite fine that a religious institution has rules as to who can marry who, but a government should wake up to the twentyfirst century and realise that there are gay couples out there. There is absolutely no reason to reserve an official, recognised bonding to two people if and only if they are of different sex. There is no such thing as the “traditional family” of a husband, wife and kids. Historically, this kind of family is quite young. Marriage in historical terms was usually a man, a wife (usually arranged by parents) and then some additional lovers for the man: a polygyny. This is the kind of thing you would find in, oh let’s see, the Old Testament. Take that, you bible-pushing asshats! The modern marriage is a fresh concoction, a new paradigm that shifts from securing family wealth to romantic love male-female monogamy. And I’m not only for breaking the opposite sex restriction, I’m also in favour of the two people restriction. Why is it not allowed for more people to join in marriage? If there is a group of censenting adults who wish to share life together, why are they restricted from doing so? What is the sin of polyamory?

There is none, and it is time to break these taboos. We must reconsider the foundations of society in a new, rational perspective. We must be wary not to accept anything just because it is historically or culturally “simply so”. It is time to critically examine every direct and indirect restriction that pesters modern day life and depraves us or our fellow human beings of freedoms they may not have even imagined of having. We must open these closed doors to knowledge and true freedom.

In the previous installment of this series I ended at the destruction of Sodom. The rest of Genesis contains some stories about the descendants of Abraham down to Jacob, father of twelve sons who would later become the fathers of the twelve Israeli tribes living in Egypt that would later find themselves enslaved: Prepair for the book of Exodus.

However, before we enter Moses, I’d like to write out some general conclusions I have made from reading Genesis. These mainly concern the biblical god (“God”). Although Christians often portray him as an altruist, the god I’ve read about is definitely not. He appoints Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as his servants and demands they act like it if they want the Lord to help them. We’ll see the same kind of egoism in Exodus, but that’s for later. The thing I was annoyed with the most in Genesis is that right in the first book it is made clear that one is not to question the Lord. The stories of the Flood and Abraham almost sacrificing his son illustrate this very well. Noach and Abraham never stop to think about the motives of this authority figure. Questioning authority is a cornerstone in skeptical freethinking. I will also note that God will make damn sure that he gets his fix of destruction while still upholding a forgiving and good-willed façade. God: “I will not utterly destroy a city if just ONE of its inhabitants is innocent of crimes I will not disclose! … Quick, Job, get out so I can destroy the city!”

Enter Moses
I’m sure you’ve heard the story. The pharao has commanded all first-borns to be killed, but Moses’ mother hides her baby in a basket along the bank of the Nile. The pharao’s daughter takes little Moses in and so he is able to grow up. After killing an Egyptian for beating a Hebrew he flees to Midian where he is taken in by Reuel/Jethro and is given Zipporah, one of Jethro’s daughters, as his wife. Some time passes before god has satisfied his sadistic needs and decided it’s time to free “his people” – meaning those unlucky enough to have born in one of the Israeli tribes, having to undergo genital mutilation after birth – and Moses is appointed his side-kick. Moses fears he lacks charismatic skills and God agrees and commends Aaron to join his brother Moses. Moses, his wife Zipporah and his children travel to Egypt. Along the way, the famous foreskin incident takes place, in which Moses is saved from God’s wrath by his son’s foreskin.

Exodus 4:24-26
At a lodging place on the way, the LORD met {Moses} and was about to kill him. But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off her son’s foreskin and touched {Moses’} feet with it. “Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me,” she said. So the LORD let him alone.

Magic and God’s sick hunger for death
Instead of sitting down and talking like adults, Moses and Aaron are sent by God to show off some magic in the hopes of impressing the pharaoh. It becomes clear freeing the Israeli slaves is not the main objective for God: He simply feel likes showing of his mad skillz (Exodus 6:3-4). And so the show begins. God starts off with his weak staff-into-snake routine the pharaoh’s sorcerers (yes, that’s what it says!) are able to replicate. The water-into-blood routine was likewise equalled by the pharaoh’s magicians. The same happens for the plague of frogs. Finally God brought something new into his act, and transformed the dust into gnats through his proxies Moses and Aaron. Still, the pharaoh didn’t let the Israeli people go. Flies ensued and boils that plagued men and cattle alike. The pharaoh began to understand he was no match for God, but God made sure he could continue his sadistic act until the very end by preventing the pharaoh let the people go (Exodus 9:12).

And so God enjoyed himself greatly, raining hail down on Egypt. “Go to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the hearts of his officials so that I may perform these miraculous signs of mine among them that you may tell your children and grandchildren how I dealt harshly with the Egyptians and how I performed my signs among them, and that you may know that I am the LORD.” God says in Exodus 10:1-2. The heavenly maniac hasn’t performed his biggest act yet, and among the locusts and darkness he makes sure the pharaoh doesn’t spoil it (Exodus 10:20, 10:27, 11:10). Having made sure it would get this far, God now feels it is time to bring out the fireworks, and kills off all the innocent people who happened to have been the first to leave the womb. God breaks his spell of the pharaoh’s mind and the Israelites are free to go.

God had one more trick up his sleeve, however. By making sure the pharaoh decides to hunt after the Israelites (Exodus 14:4), he can perform one more miracle for the world – a last violent encore to add to the slaughter already committed. He made sure the Israelites didn’t choose the shortest path to the promised land; hell, there wouldn’t be a sea to split along that way! And so, even after the Egyptian slaughter, god’s hunger for death was finally stilled when he drowned the Egyptians after making sure the Israelites were able to traverse the Red Sea.

And returning to my opening paragraph, Exodus accounts again for the fact that God is not altruist at all. As if the gratification of his hunger wasn’t enough, the price for freeing the Hebrew slaves from Egypt was high: God demanded all the firstborn male that would see the light of life thereafter, men and cattle alike, to be his property. This means sacrifice, people. But not to worry, God will make sure you’re kids are fine – for the right price, tha tis. “Redeem with a lamb every firstborn donkey, but if you do not redeem it, break its neck. Redeem every firstborn among your sons.” (Exodus 13:13)

Next up in Reading the Bible Part 3: Commandments and laws

So here it is: The first part to my reading quest. In this article I will comment on Genesis chapters 1-19. All chapters from 11-50 deal with the familiy history of Adam’s direct descendants. Some of these are important characters in biblical mythology, such as Noach and Abraham. Others seem not so much important, and it’s certainly possible that I will jump to the book of Exodus in the next edition of “Reading the Bible”, as the later chapters (for as far as I have read) do not have much interesting to add.

The first chapters of Genesis deal with well-known biblical stories: The creation, the garden of Eden and the tree of knowledge, Noach’s Ark and the flood, Abraham’s deal with God and the destruction of Sodom.

Creation
It was interesting to read the creation story, because it illustrates the pritimive knowledge (or rather: ideas) of the universe the ancient people, among who was the author of Genesis, had. The sky, “heaven”, is portrayed as a half sphere that is placed on top of the earth and which divides the waters of our planet and the waters above the heavens – yes indeed, apparently there is water in space, not a vacuum. In the half sphere that is heaven, God puts up some lamps and among them one big one to rule the day, and a smaller one to rule the night. Not only shows this that the nature of stars wasn’t undestood, but also that there wasn’t a clear distinction between stars and moons. After God has some plants and trees pop up, he creates the animals. In Biblical taxonomy, the main categories are: Birds, fish, wild animals, livestock and creatures that crawl. After all that, God creates man and woman.

In the second book of Genesis, man seems to be created before all flora, and definitely before the wild anmimals and birds. However, I’m not going into every contradiction because I’d never get through the Bible before I turn thirty. I just want to say that I think the accusation that the two creation accounts in Genesis 1 and Genesis 2 are contradictory is justified.

Eden
Skipping ahead a bit, we’ll get our first share of talking animals: a snake, who seduces Eve to eat from the tree of knowledge. This actually constitutes the first big issue I have with christianity: the negative attitude to knowledge. Incarnations of this meme can be found throughout history, from Galileo Galilei to the modern day creationism crap. God would rather have wanted us to stay ignorant of the world, imprisoned in a garden. Eating from the tree of knowledge constitutes the aspiration to becoming gods – and that’s wrong for some reason. Personally, I encourage this aspiration. When a scientists who was working on genetic manipulation for protein development was asked whether he was playing for god, he answered: “I’m not playing” and it is such an attitude that deserves respect. I can’t wait to go post-human.

In any case, God wasn’t amused and felt threatened. To ensure his totalitarian reign, he punished women by making sure childbirth isn’t fun, and that the men will reign over them. He punished men by making sure they’d have to work hard to stay alive. He ban-kicked Adam and Eve out of Eden, and placed Cherubs with flaming swords (cool!) in East Eden to protect the way to the tree of life; making people wouldn’t live forever.

Noach and the flood
People didn’t live forever, that’s for sure, but I’d say 900 years is pretty close considering our current life expectancy. While the descendants of Adam and Eve were populating the earth and fucking like rabbits, God got more and more pissed off. He decreed that people shouldn’t live more than 120 years. God became sorry that he created humankind, because to him all of them were “bad” for reasons unknown. Luckily, he came up with a solution: Fucking kill them all, and with them all the animals: divine global genocide. God liked Noach though, and commanded him to build a boat too small considering its purpose. He told Noach to bring on board one pair of each animal seven pairs of clean animal and one pair of unclean animals and seven pairs of each kind of bird and NOach agreed and brought on board one pair of each animal seven pairs of clean animals and birds and one pair of unclean animals one pair of each animal. And so, after the flood, Noach and his family and the animals on the earth began the task of repopulating the earth.

Abraham’s deal with God
Following the line of first sons from Noach to Abra(ha)m, who is a strange character. He leads an army and kills off the army that sacked Sodom. When the king of Sodom wants to give Abram a reward, he suddenly turns holy and swears by the lord that he will not take anything, because it isn’t his to take – forgetting the lives of those soldiers he killed a moment ago. God, however, is impressed by Abram and appears to him in a vision and tells him he will bless him. Abram sacrifices some nice cattle too God, who loves dead cattle (Ask Cain!). After the birth of Abram’s first son Ismael, God appears to Abram again and asks him to become his little bitch. First of all, God changes Abram’s name to Abraham. God says he will bless Abraham’s descendants with kingship and furthermore offers Abraham and his descendants a big land. In return, God asks Abraham to cut off the end of his and his descendants penis. In this way, God will have a way to recognize who his has to bless, and who his has to curse. Abraham agreed, and showed great courage but sawing off the end of his penis when he was already 99 years old. He mutilated his extramarital son’s genitals that same day, too.

The destruction of Sodom
God tells Abraham of a serious accusation against Sodom. There is never any mentioning of a jury or judge to either confirm or reject this accusation, because God takes matters in his own hands. He tells that he will destroy Sodom and everybody in it. Abraham asks if God would destroy Sodom even if there was one person innocent in the whole city, and God tells Abraham he would leave the city alone if this would be so. Luckily for the people living in Sodom, Abrahams nephew Lot lives in Sodom, and he is quite innocent indeed. You’d guess there’s no need to worry for the city and its inhabitants because of God’s promise. However, God has a trick up his sleeve. He can’t wait to commit another genocide, and sends two angels to Lot. These angels get Lot out of the city, making way for the sickly murderous God to rain fire and sulphur down on the city.

Other general remarks
One thing that I thought was remarkable was the consequent mentioning of animal (and almost human) sacrifice to God. It shows the connection of OT Christianity with other ancient religion in which such sacrifices were the norm – of course, current day Christianity would rather forget this tradition while still hoping they can get away with calling the Bible timeless. Women’s rights are also non-existant. Men used to marry multiple women – even Abraham slept around with his wife’s slave to produce a receptacle for Abraham’s offspring – he’ll be damned to give it to his wife! Another interesting instance of cruelty against women is when the angels enter Lot’s home. The people of Sodom demand Lot to bring the strangers that entered his home, but he offers his virgin daughters instead, saying the Sodomites can do with them whatever they want.

In the coming months, I will be publishing articles that are the direct consequence of my confrontation with the Christian Holy Hardcover I have purchased. I have been playing with the idea for a while and I’ve presented the idea to the ACP community over at last.fm. Yesterday I received that number one best-seller of all times, and I’ll be keeping you up to date with my thoughts about its actual content.

The Art of War
My foremost reason for reading the bible is simply because I am interested about the actual, integral contents of this most famous book. I have been reading some mythology literature as of late, and the Bible adds well to that list. As an opponent of religious doctrine in general and Christianity in particular and remembering Sun Tzu I feel obliged to study its roots.

I will be reading the bible critically, as any book that is considered to hold truth should. However, I will make distinctions (and analyse differently accordingly) between parts presented as matter-of-fact (such as Genesis) and symbolically laden parts (such as Jesus’ parables). I will try to form an image “from the Bible up” of important Biblical characters such as God and Jesus – letting go of previous conceptions.

I will write articles whenever I feel I have enough to talk about. Therefore, I will not guarantee articles to be spaced evenly over time. Any other questions or recommendations are welcome and can be posted in the comment section.

I will first provide definitions of the three words I used in the title. I will use Wikipedia as a source for the definitions, because I think the dictionary definitions I have seen are too short to encompass what they mean. I put more trust in the encyclopedic definition more or less agreed on by the collective conciousness that manifests itself on Wikipedia.

Religion:

A religion is a set of beliefs and practices, often centered upon specific supernatural and moral claims about reality, the cosmos, and human nature, and often codified as prayer, ritual, or religious law. Religion also encompasses ancestral or cultural traditions, writings, history, and mythology, as well as personal faith and religious experience.

(Source page)

Politics

Politics is the process by which groups of people make decisions.

(Source page

Science

Science (from the Latin scientia, meaning “knowledge”) is the effort to discover, understand, or to understand better, how the physical world works, with observable physical evidence as the basis of that understanding.

(Source page)

From their definitions alone one would not immediately suspect that these three come into contact with eachother. I need not remind you how the religionists (forgive my lack of a better word) have clashed with the scientists in deciding whether to teach creationism or intelligent design (which was ruled to be the same in this court case, so I will use the terms interchangeably) in public schools – which I will use as the primary example in this article, tiring as it may be. There are more interactions between these three than just collisions. There have been allegements, both explicit and implicit by the religious that I want to examine and, to be frank, tear down. Without going into the actual issue, I just want to make a few remarks about trends that I have seen.

First of all I want to talk about the religionists attempts to put the stamp of “science” on their ideas. This does not only concern creationism: rather a lot of Christians are trying to wedge in the idea that their claims about the bible, human nature and the universe are backed up by (scientific) evidence. These religionists’ reasons for this may be apparent: in convincing non-believers of their found “truth”, whacking them around the ears with a bible or qur’an does not work any more in these modern times. Rather than convincing people of the messages in their holy scriptures, they are convincing people that their supernatural claims are compatible with the world perspective science offers, or worse: that their supernatural claims are actually the product of science. Anyone who has ever really dealt with science would immediately remember that (in science) the bible and the qur’an are not accepted sources of information for reasons so plethoric I deem it unnecessary to mention any of them.

Secondly I want to talk about the religionists’ attempt to put the stamp of “religion” or “politics” on science. The argument that science is just another faith or religion is well-known. The question whether science is religion has been answered eloquently by Richard Dawkins (among others) in this article, concluding that science is “free of the main vice of religion, which is faith” and that even though nothing can epistemically be defended for a hundred percent, there is a “difference in the world between a belief that one is prepared to defend by quoting evidence and logic and a belief that is supported by nothing more than tradition, authority, or revelation.”

Science has also been bombarded as a political system with an agenda. Coined terms like “evolutionists” or “Darwinism” are the incarnations of these attacks. The terms don’t maky any sense at all, as the former merely seems to be a response to the term “creationists”. Calling someone an “evolutionist” accurately implies that that person accept evolution, but it is void of additional meaning when compared to “scientist”. Anyone who accepts science, automatically accepts all scientific concepts, including evolution. The word “evolutionists” would only make sense if there were people who do not accept science, but do accept evolution – which is silly.

The word “Darwinism” more explicit in it’s attempt to ascribe political load to the concept of evolution. More recently “Darwinism” has unapologetically been abused in the “documentary” Expelled as an inspiration for the Nazis, and subsequently, the holocaust. It is nasty blow below the belt and an unacceptable, blatantly misleading lie to the public. The line of reasoning involved in this conclusion hinges on basic misunderstandings of religion (a very illustrative one being that if Hitler was truly inspired by evolution, he would have needed to do nothing as evolution dictates that the better “race” prevails automatically). More importantly, it should be noted that there is no such thing is Darwinism. If there would be, then where is Einsteinism or Newtonism? “Darwinism”, like “evolutionist” is void.

It all seems like religionists are trying to divide science, putting the same scientific principles under different sounding categories, and then attacking these categories. They forget that science works under the assumptions that there is one universe (or “truth”) and that laws that describe that universe do not change with time or space. Therefore, science is a single, solid system. It is not at all like the macrocosmic variety of religions, varying (in time and space) from Zoroastrianism and Taoism to Christianity and the Norse pantheon, or the microcosm of one such religion such as Christianity, varying (again in time and space) from Mormonism and the Seventh Day Adventists to Catholicism and Protestantism).

I can only conclude that the religious are very desperately looking for measures to get what they want. It includes trying to level with the successful unity that is science and it’s foundation “reason”, either by trying to portray themselves as scientific or by making up sections of science which they attack with slanderous lies. Also resorting to claims that science has been infiltrated by the immoral godless who are purposely hiding the truth and demanding “equality” have luckily not had any legal support. I guess they also fail to realise that the high percentage of atheists in the scientific community is a product of the amounted knowledge and understanding of the universe that does not require a god.

I urge nobody to give into the usage of words like “evolutionist”, “Darwinist” or any other void description of what it is supposed to represent. We, as scientists, atheists, humanists, and freethinkers must keep an eye out for these kinds of religious political motives to safeguard the secular stronghold insofar it exists today and potentially exists tomorrow.

Lately in an intense debate about homosexuality with commenter Brian a lot of mentions of sin came up. Apparently, being born earns you a one-way ticket to hell, unless you telepathically make up with sonny Jesus. Indeed, we’re all sinful and we must wash those nasty metaphysical shit-stains away before we can even think of walking through the pearly gates and receiving a pat on the back from Peter. I’d love to meet people like George Carlin, Albert Einstein, Nietzsche, Plato and other brilliant minds of the past, as well as contemporary geniuses like Stephen Hawking and Daniel Dennett – but I must confess I could never really stand heat and overcrowded places, so I guess it’s time for me to confess my sins to miracle-man J.C.

Sorry J.C., I’ve read parts of your old man’s book, and I thought it was utter shit. I plan on reading the thing integrally soon, so maybe that will alleviate some of my doubts I have about claims about your daddy. It’s just that it doesn’t make any sense to me, and that the parts I’ve read are inconsistent. Sometimes it appears that the book has been written by many people over a huge span of time, but that’s just silly. And even if it is, it’s inspired by The Cosmic Dude, and he wouldn’t constantly change his mind, would He? Maybe the doubts that have come to mind would vanish if I stopped using logic, because logic may very well not apply to the Big Guy. I’ll try that.

Sorry J.C., I have an inquisitive nature. I try to understand the world within a framework that is internally consistent and from which I can make predictions so I can test whether my framework is correct. If my understanding is sufficient, I try to manipulate the universe so it will act in a way that fits my needs, like other people have so I can write this article and spread this information on a global interconnected network. I’m even studying biomedical engineering so I can help people overcome disease, or make their suffering less. I’m really sorry for that J.C., I know you’d rather see me have faith, and not interfere with the Man’s big plans or try to uncover his creation. Those ill people must surely have had it coming from The Benevolent One, because of their filthy sins.

Sorry J.C., I’ve been trying to treat people equally. I’ve had the delusion that we all should just get along, and not give special treatment (either positive or negative) according to the people’s cultural background, religion, appearance or sexual preference. But I realise now, we should stop these false religions such as science and save the scientists from their demonic sect. We must deny them the rights that allow them to spread their vile and putrid ideas. We have to inform them of You, J.C., even if they say they don’t want anything to do with you – in their hearts they do! I’ve always accepted that homo- and bisexuals are simply born with other sexual preferences and let them have their way. I’ve always advocated that they have the same rights as heterosexuals, because I never found any reason why they ought not have them. I’m sorry I let you down J.C., I’m sorry I defended these people from the wrath of your followers – when clearly Father thinks they’re not people at all, but rather animals.

Sorry J.C., I’m sure that I’ve sinned more, but I can’t think of any more sins. I don’t feel cleansed yet, but that’s just because I’m sinful no matter, right? Maybe I should just go around and inform people of how bad they’re living their life and make them feel bad and fill them with fear for the licking flames of hell – people need that, they don’t listen to reason anymore. Just asking them to accept you in faith is a thing of the past. But I’ve accepted you, J.C., and I hope you can put in a good word with your omnibenevolent father, so he may not roast, burn and choke me for all eternity until the end of time. I have faith it’ll be all-right, he’s a reasonable man…

After only minor revisions of the long standing FAQ Wiki we’ve finally come to including it on the Antichristian Phenomenon website as a finished page. You can click this link or use the top FAQ tab to view the page we’ve all been waiting for.

There is a kind of argument theists will use constantly in a debate. It appears in various forms, but the basics are all the same. In my many debates with christians I have recently had to endure another barrage of this argument, so I thought it was about time I adressed this in a more formal way – this article.

So what is the argument I’m talking about? I’ve come to calling it the “true christian” argument, but I’m sure it’s valid for any kind of theist. You’ve probably encountered it before. The christian or theist will say: “But that’s not what the Bible says” or “Those people aren’t real christians” or “You didn’t get the message from that verse/chapter/book”. It can all be placed in the same umbrella: The accusation that your or somebody else’s interpretation of some verse, or the bible integrally, is incorrect. I’ve had christians tell me that the bible is not open to interpretation, but I have also had christians tell me I mustn’t take it too literally. Both think their view of the bible and its message is correct and they will use that assumption as the “true christian” argument in a debate.

The former argues that the Bible is the actual and literal word of god, not to be interpreted subjectively. This creates some clashes not only with our current understanding of the world and its workings, but also internally the bible contradicts itself [1. Contradictions in the bible (Skeptic's Annotated Bible)]. The latter usually pops up when you swing a random “blood-’n-guts” type verse in their face and ask them to explain  where the loving god went and they tell you it is not to be taken literally. This creates a diversity of problems ranging from the questions which parts of the bible are to be taken literally and which not, to the possibility of different interpretation and the loss of original meaning (if there was one).

The fact is that the last issue I put forward is what has been happening for thousands of years. The bible is a collection of books written over a span of many years – not a technical specification for a device called “life”. Upon reading the bible it is unavoidable that you interpret it in a certain way while you are trying to uncover what it means. It doesn’t matter whether you read it as an important literary work or as the word of your god – in both cases you are going to make up your mind about the bible’s content. A well-known part of the bible is the Exodus [2. The Exodus (BibleGateway.com)]: Moses, the ten plagues, the Pharaoh and the enslaved Jewish people. From it one could conclude that God takes care of his people, which would put him in a good light. One could also conclude that God, while all-powerful, still deemed it necessary to kill many innocent first-borns in order to grant freedom to a people. Both conclusions can be defended  (and have been).

The important thing about these various, possibly opposing interpretations is that they can all be defended using the bible. I have often expressed my view of god as an oppressive, fascistic dictator who I would oppose if he existed. I didn’t make that view up; it is my interpretation of god as I have read about him in the bible. But not only non-christians like me have read (parts of) the bible and made up their minds about its contents; people who call themselves christians have too. Siding the plethora of denominations, there are also the non-denominational christians who have their own brand of Christianity. Denominations can disagree on pretty important issues too. During history, schisms and off-branching of christian denominations has occurred in plentitude [3. Historical schism Schemes of Christian theology (Wikipedia).]. Simply consider the fact that there are denominations in christianity that are a response to another denomination, as is the case with Protestantism (versus Roman Catholicism). Also consider the “shunning” of a christian denomination by many other christian denominations, such as is the case with Mormonism (for their “blasphemous” Book of Mormon) and the Westboro Baptist Church (known for their “Thank god for dead soldiers” funeral protests and “God Hates Fags” website [4. GodHatesFags]) – even though their views, mine and the pope’s can be defended succesfully using the same book.

Interpretations of the bible has led to people who do not identify themselves as christians, to denominational christians and to non-denominational christians. The last two often clash between them and also internally to what the true christian message is – if there even is one. Deriving a message from the bible is taken very seriously for no apparent reason other than faith that there should be a message in it.  The so-called professional experts (theologians) can’t seem to agree – even though there exists the general consensus that they are trying to uncover the same message. Using the argument “<You/They> clearly didn’t understand <that part of the bible>” in the light of the previous conclusion is therefore pompous and far from a legitimate argument, and I would like to invite theists to come up with something better.