I am not a Christian. Therefore, if I were to ask a true Christian -- a person brimming with good Christian values, the propaganda goes -- "What will happen to me when I die?" they would have to say, if honest, "You are going to hell."
How would I respond? I might remark, "Actually, that's not true. I know for a fact that when I die I'm going to Vermont . . . which is the polar opposite of hell, at least in terms of climate."
There would be some truth to my words. My wife and I have a burial plot in a small hillside graveyard off a dirt road in the boondocks of Vermont. It is staggeringly beautiful there. Unfortunately, I'm sure I won't appreciate the view from six feet under. But that's where my ashes will go. I'm fairly certain.
In my response to the Christian, I might further ask, "Why is there no mention of a heavenly afterlife in 70% of the Bible? It's the first 70%, at that."
Noah, Joseph, Jacob, David, Solomon, Job . . . . No heaven for them (see 2 Kings 1:10; 2 Kings 10:35; 2 Kings 13:20; 2 Chronicles 9:31; 2 Chronicles 16:30; 2 Chronicles 23:16; Job 7:21; Job 14:10; Job 17:1; Job 30:23; Job 42:16; Psalms 4:8; Psalms 128:6; Ecclesiastes 3:19, etc.). Their reward for faith in a god: land, many children, many days. After they lived to a ripe old age they simply died and were buried.
"And then he rested with his fathers," is not the same as, "and then he ascended unto heaven." "He rested with his fathers" was a nice way of saying his bones joined the bones of his relatives in the family plot. Also, it was indeed a more desired way to end your days than to, say, have your bones thrown in a trash heap due to low status in life and/or getting killed by a conquering people.
Why is this central component to Christianity -- assuring oneself a place in a great kingdom in the sky -- a relative afterthought in the Bible rather than a consistent, core theme?
Why no heaven for Abraham, no heaven for Moses? Did the supposedly singular god of the Bible change his mind? [Queue the clever rationalizations of believers...]
My answer: the Bible is a compilation of books by human writers who had no supernatural guidance.
He sees you when you're sleeping
He knows when you're awake
He knows if you've been bad or good
So be good for goodness sake. (64)
Although the above words are about a supernatural being, that being is not considered a god. Maybe a saint, but not a god. Yet the watching is god-like. Besides Santa Claus, personal gods tend to have the ability to monitor behavior. They can watch you and judge your behavior as bad or good. Because there is no limit to their seeing, you will not get away with violating the rules of your religion. As the Biblical character Job laments, Will you never look away from me? (Job 7:19)
In any primate group their must be a balance between behavior that is directly self-serving and behavior that serves to maintain group integrity. There are thus checks and balances, including the instinct to be vigilant for cheaters—you can’t trust them, can you?—and to punish violators. A good example of this are the many economic/psychological studies employing the “ultimatum” game. In an extreme version, two complete strangers--individuals not of the same group past or future--must divide a sum of money. One stranger decides upon his cut of the money, say a total of $100. He or she then slides the remaining amount under the door to the unseen and unknown other. If the other accepts that amount, they both get to keep the money. If not, neither gets any money. Manifesting just how social a species we are, most individuals in this scenario will split the money equally or near-equally and slide 40 or 50 dollars under the door. Both players walk away richer. When the money is unevenly divided, however, the risk for rejection of the sum rises dramatically, the result being that both players walk away with nothing gained. And it happens more often than you would think. Many an individual receiving a 20 dollar cut will refuse the free money. He or she will instead punish the unfairness, in effect punishing themselves as well. No one likes a cheater.
In her paper on the evolution of cheater detection, Denise D. Cummins wrote, “[C]heater detection plays a broader role in social coordination as a fundamental, primitive cognitive adaptation to dominance hierarchies. . . . In order to maintain priority of access to resources, dominant individuals monitor the behavior of subordinates and aggress against those who “cheat” (violate social norms).” (65)
As a super-dominant being, you would expect a god to monitor the behavior of all of its subordinates and punish those caught cheating. Even in social groups where rules and laws have not been codified by religion, and where a single, supreme alpha has not been designated, you will often find invisible spirits that take an interest in 'who does what.' (66) Why would these para-normal entities care? Because, in some way, they are one of us; we are them. One characteristic that distinguishes the religious from the paranormal is consistent involvement and interest of the invisible party. Thoughts of a door-banging and chain-dragging kind of ghost may be spooky, but they fail to incite social emotions as readily as the holy-ghost kind of invisible entity. Only one of these kinds of ghosts will make us wonder if “they” know about our recent behavioral transgression.
In his book on evolutionary underpinnings of religion, anthropologist Scott Atran notes that if we want to enforce a social contract made between individuals, get more people involved. Make social contracts a community affair. For then there will be more eyes watching for violation and a greater probability that a wronged party will have someone to back them up in a dispute. What typically makes social contracts a community affair? Religion. Atran writes, “Displays of commitment to supernatural agents signal sincere willingness to cooperate with the community of believers.” (67)
Not only do invisible alphas provide a super-member for a group to form around, as dominant beings they are especially good at catching cheaters, and thus, presumably, at deterring cheating. Psychological experiments conducted on human primates have found that when adopting a status of high-rank, an individual will be more vigilant for cheating than when adopting a position of low rank.(68) It seems we innately expect for more dominant individuals to watch over less.
When a king sits on his throne to judge, he winnows out all evil with his eyes. (Proverbs 20:8)
And so we invite a super-being into our social circle to help us be good, to get along. In her ruminations about the origins of church-going rituals, Karen Armstrong notes that from early Biblical texts it can be surmised that early, semi-nomadic Israelites carried the “home” of their god with them—the Ark of the Covenant. In tent-walled temples, they renewed their commitment to Yahweh, their number one, and through him, to one another. (69)
Is this a reason for church-going behavior today? Do individuals gather together to acknowledge their number one? Does church-going strengthen individual commitment to a group, does it remind members of important social rules? Do the texts and teachings inform them they are being watched, and if they violate the special rules they will receive not coal in their Christmas stocking, but something worse?
Do you really want to risk being bad? You better watch out.
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(64) "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" by John Frederick Coots and Haven Gillespie
(65) Cummins, D. D. “Cheater Detection is Modified by Social Rank: The Impact of Dominance of the Evolution of Cognitive Functions,” Evolution and Human Behavior, Volume 20, Issue 4, July 1999, 220-248.
(66) Wilson, D.S. Darwin’s Cathedral: Evolution, Religion, and the Nature of Society, University of Chicago, Chicago, 2002, p. 64
(67) Atran, S., In God’s We Trust: The Evolutionary Landscape of Religion, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2002, p.16
(68) Cummins, D. D., July 1999, 220-248.
(69) Armstrong, K. The Great Transformation: The Beginning of our Religious Traditions, Knopf, New York, 2006, p.43
You've heard the Biblical injunction, "spare the rod, spoil the child." As educated people are aware, and hopefully most parents, psychological research has shown the opposite is more likely to be true. Use the rod, spoil the child. And by "spoil" I mean make it more likely your child will show behavior problems and perhaps even deficits in cognitive development (see my post - Better Science on Spanking).
New research has found an additional drawback to "harsh discipline." In the words of study authors Victoria Talwar and Kang Lee -
"[A] punitive environment not only fosters increased dishonesty but also children's abilities to lie to conceal their transgressions." [source]
Ruh-roh, Scoobie! Should the Bible be revised ASAP? A more wise saying might be, "Bear the rod and your child is more likely to tell a lie, potentially violating a commandment."
Of course, I wouldn't be a full-blooded skeptic if I just accepted a study conclusion without looking further, without asking questions. Perhaps the most important question is "What was the quantity and quality of the data the conclusion was based upon?"
Let's see . . . An experiment (good). Two groups of children (good). Doesn't say how many (boo). Children from same neighborhood (good). Children apparently not randomly assigned to two groups. Not so good.
Okay, not a five-star study, as far as I can tell. So I wouldn't be too confident of the finding. But it is suggestive. And it coincides with previous research.
Also, the finding supports my prior beliefs, which counts for something, right?
That was test. WRONG. Because the finding supports my beliefs, I actually ought to be more skeptical of it. To counter-balance a way our thoughts can be skewed and achieve greater rationality.
Damn, sometimes skepticism ain't fun. At least if you want to harbor a belief in the infallibility of your own thoughts and feelings.
Many people put the Bible on a pedestal, as if it were a perfect document, filled with wisdom. To those who think so, I say, Read it--all of it.
Oh, sure, there are the occasional pearls of wisdom, such as: Thou shalt not covet they neighbor's donkey. Nor wife.
Bible worshipers habitually use one or two dozen words very selectively clipped from their revered book to support some position on X, Y, or Z. Should women be ordained as ministers? You can find a few passages that can be construed as supporting this, many more in opposition. The answer to the question of the ordainment of women is then: a) yes b) no c) neither of the above d) all of the above.
One Bible -- so many possibilities. Every week ministers, priests, and preachers string a few "pearls" of what they consider biblical wisdom together to hang their sermon upon.
Once, when in the library lobby at the college where I taught, I picked up a copy of a free Christian newsletter. The lead article "What Do I Owe These People?" for the week's issue of Gospel Minutes, was a transcribed sermon. In it the author, David Thurman, explored the attitude Christians should take toward their church. The subtitles to the long article consisted of these points. 1. Don't Offend It 2. Build It 3. Proclaim It 4. Motivate It 5. Put Up with It 6. Defend It
To add divine authority to his points, in each of the sub-sections the writer spliced in a passage from the Bible, chapter and verse. That some of these "pearls of wisdom" were contradictory to each other was glaringly obvious. At least to me. I wondered why other readers of the rag wouldn't scratch their head in wonderment upon encountering a bald case of something not making sense.
In the section, "Don't Offend It," the preacher used 1 Corinthians to make this point: Christians are not to Associate with those who call themselves Christians but do not live like it. You give offense to the church when you choose to sin.
One page later, under "Put Up with It," the very same preacher picks a gem from Ephesians to argue this: As believers we are to put up with each other. That means we tolerate each other, in spite of our failings....the church is not perfect, it is full of people who still struggle with sin.
In the above passages we've got six plus six equaling six. First, don't hang out with those who sin, because you give offense to the church. Second, tolerate each other because the church is not perfect. In fact, it is full of sinners.
Confused? Allow me to translate: Don't associate with sinners because you give offense to an entity that is imperfect and full of sinners.
At its very foundation, and with each story built above, religion relies upon shared values and beliefs. Preaching largely consists of the neatly circumscribed reasoning used to safely promote one's own set of values and beliefs.
In the Bible you will not find the book "The Catholic Gospel," nor "The Baptist Gospel." Etc. (Or more specifically, "The 1950s Alabama Baptists Gospel" . . . "The 1970s Massachusetts Catholic Gospel" . . . etc.) Rather, each congregation mines the pages of the Bible for material that supports their present brand of belief, their current set of values.
One reason why the Bible is such a popular book is precisely because it presents no perfectly clear and consistent message. To just about any important question of the day, one can find a multitude of answers. Which makes the document not correct, but handy. Like a social tool of the Swiss Army knife variety.
BELIEVE and true it shall be!
The above bit of wisdom was provided to me by a local, streetside church marquee.
Okay. I believe I will win this week's Florida State Lottery. And here's the potentially astounding part--the part that would make this not just a fabulous coincidence, but a bona fide miracle--I haven't bought a ticket. Let's see what happens.
One of the prophecies contained in the Bible is that Jesus had predicted he would be double-crossed by Judas. And he was. (He also predicted that the Roman Lions would beat the Jerusalem Wildebeest, in overtime, at the coliseum. He was off on the point spread, but close.)
I wonder, why hadn't Jesus used his 4-dimensional space-time vision to divine the exact time and place he would rise after death? Can you imagine the crowds? They could have sold tickets and set up a table of baked goods to raise money for the new church.
I can't find the answer to that one in the Bible, but I did find this. Acts 16:31 in the King James Version reads
Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.
And thy house? I thought each person has to accept Jesus as their personal Lord and Savior and Spiritual Fitness Trainer. What if a teenager with eleven brothers and sisters is saved? Are those already off to college also saved? What about the live-in nanny from Pakistan? She spends more time with the kids than mom does, so I don't see why not.
In the same section of the Bible (Acts 17:22) we also discover this gem:
Then Paul stood in the midst of Mars hill, and said, Ye men of Athens, I perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious.
This is clearly a case of a crock calling the kettle full of beans.
Acts 19:11 makes an impressive point.
And God wrought special miracles by the hands of Paul.
Special miracles for an audience of special believers. (It seems I am in a snarky mood.)
And finally--for the purpose of this rambling rant--we arrive at a story as told in Acts 20:9-12:
And there sat in a window a certain young man named Eutychus, being fallen into a deep sleep: and as Paul was long preaching, he sunk down with sleep, and fell down from the third loft, and was taken up dead. And Paul went down, and fell on him, and embracing him said, Trouble not yourselves; for his life is in him. When he therefore was come up again and had broken bread, and eaten, and taken and talked a long while, even till break of day, so he departed. And they brought the young man alive, and were not a little comforted.
Paul was so long-winded he bored a young man to death. Same thing almost happened to me each and every Sunday my mother dragged our family to church. Bored to death. But rather than sliding off the pew and onto the marble floor, I blocked out the priest and prayed. I prayed in vivid detail, often with imagined sound effects. I asked the god of my church (I didn't know of any others back then) to convince my father to buy me that Honda dirt bike advertised in the pages of Boys Life magazine. Not the dinky one with the lawnmower engine and the wheelbarrow tires. The one with the handlebar throttle and chrome exhaust pipe.
My prayer was never answered, no matter how hard I squeezed my palms and eyelids together, no matter how many times I included "please," in my inwardly whispered words. I don't know why. Who knows, maybe my prayer went unanswered because America is a Christian nation and I had requested a motorcycle made in Japan, which is a "what-the-hell-do-they-worship?" nation.
Perhaps that church marquee should be amended this way: Believe in something; and something will happen. Just don't get too specific.
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