A long time ago, well like 12 years or so. I decided one night to start reading the Bible just because I hadn't at that point. Jess had an old one so instead of reading a science book or something science fictiony I picked up the 'good book.' I think I got through 2 pages, maybe a bit more. It was just bad to me.
So a few years ago I found this site, actually run by atheists, where they were trying to read the Bible one page at a time everyday or every other day. I got to Genesis 21 or something before I stopped. It was just not my cup of tea, It was bad, completely wrong about anything close to the origin of life on the planet or indeed the universe itself. And it was BORING. So very BORING. I usually give books 50 pages or so to keep me interested, I rarely put a book down or stop watching a movie because it's bad. But I did with this, just like I did with the Flintstones movie (that got 10 minutes.)
This is stuff I've gone over before, but it turns out I'm not the only one who thinks the Bible is drek. Jerry Coyne over at Why Evolution is True has come to the same conclusion. The funny thing is I love all those old crazy creation myths, they are kooky fun, but the Bible is just so blah, there is no style, no flare and it's main character? Wow, talk about weak and uninteresting. He doesn't do anything but kill people, where is the intrigue? The gripping back story? All the stuff about Lucifer and the war with god aren't even in the damn thing and they are by far WAY more interesting. Nope we get a co-dependent god who simply must have people worship him or he kills them, but they have 'free will'. Boy this sounds like the worst cobbled together image comic ever!
Anywho, there is also this amazingly stupid thing that the state of Louisiana has done. Oh The South, when will you come into the 20th century with the rest of the world..? Except South Korea, because the Christians got a hold of them as well and took out evolution in their schools too. Those Christians really do love forcing their views on anybody. Man, I'm really starting to not like them. Its like they want me to hate them because they 'love me'. I try to fight my xenophobic urges but they make it soooo easy to fall back on their bad habbits....
Best,
Brett
9 comments:
The bible IS poorly written and EXTREMELY boring throughout most of it. That's why people need preachers and priests to give them the cliff notes so to speak. Not only do they get the bible in a(barely) more entertaining fashion this way. The speaker also gets to insert their spin on passages that might otherwise be morally questionable or indecipherable to the public.
This way the public can proudly proclaim their faith, "knowledge of God's word and what God truly want's for everyone's lives.
Although in reality, this is as pointless as watching FOX news for honest, unbiased, reporting.
It really is a shame about all the southern goings on as of late. Because if you take away all of the bigotry and bible thumping, you're left with one of the greatest culinary contribution mankind has ever known. My personal place of zen...slow smoked, southern BB-Q. It didn't originated there, but they sure as hell perfected it!
You gotta keep reading til you hit God calling for genocides in the Book of Joshua.
By the time I got there in bible class in undergrad, I got so pissed.
I didn't make me an atheist, but it certainly laid eggs.
This was the good book!
And God was telling people to do what we'd now call genocide. God wasn't suggesting it. He telling them to do so!
I later learned that this passage was used by the Massachusetts Puritans (some of my ancestors) to massacre Native Americans. Just as God told Joshua and his people to massacre and drive out the Canaanites, God wants His new chosen people, the Puritans, to do the same in the New World, where the New Jerusalem will be built.
The sad thing about you having to tell a certain individual not to post on your blog, is that it had to come to that.
I harbour no ill will towards them, I just feel that they are very misguided, and using a text book that has not been translated very well as their defence. And this is coming from a theist.
I also appreciate the privilege of being allowed to post on another user's blog. If we cannot agree on something, then it is simply 'agree to disagree'.
The saddest thing about the current 'creationiists' is they say that their religion disproves science, yet, in a further case of humanity moving backwards, or, as some might say, devolving (controversial, eh?) if they took one step backwards ie read a book, they would see that their religion is responsible for science. The renaissance gave birth to massive influx of scientific study, such as Leonardo DaVinci studying and drawing a human embryo, dispelling the story of the homonculus.
Yet nowadays, their is such a massive divide, in America, in particular, between science and religion, that one has to wonder what the hell happened over the last 1000 years or so? Did society lose intelligence, evolving into a new type of intelligence lacking organism? The one that prefers to get cliff notes than actually search for their own opinion.
And we have all this terrible information being dished out to people, who don't question it. No wonder Fox news can run for as long as it has, because nobody is willing to search for their own information.
The most worrying thing about this is that America is the country with WMD's and a large degree of ignorance as to why people are afraid of what the next president will do.
How long until we get a president who believes we have to 'nuke' the enemy? And a vice president who agrees?
A lot of renaissance scientist and thinkers made the invaluable discoveries they did, BECAUSE they were trying find or prove God in all of it. They did what a lot of religious folk do still today, which is agree with a scientific, natural explanation of what they could understand and figure out. Everything beyond that was God.
The "God of the gaps" argument has been around for a loooong time.
I don't think it's society devolving or lacking intelligence. I believe it's simply the virtual tsunami of information readily available at ones finger tips. Some of it correct and spot on, while other info is misleading and deceptive. There's no filter, no censor, no panel of consensus and a lot of times no context with which to discern intent.
Society in general IS lazy and gladly lets others do the thinking for them. Add to that the right wing propaganda machines like FOX News, self righteous, feel good, prosperity gospel charlatans,Theocratic politicians, and slime ball(money motivated) creationists/apologists like Ken Ham, Ray Comfort, Kent Hovind and William Lane Craig. All trying to shove the gospel were it doesn't belong and actively make America stupider.
It's no wonder that kids and young adults today who were brought up by technology to have the attention span of a pot smoking, ADD, goldfish, don't know what to believe and readily accept the first thing that sound interesting to them.
I'm a bit behind this week, my fricken neck just won't stop hurting. Time for some prayin!
Scottie,
I'm not sure I could read that far... after the whole Free will thing and the Pharroh, and then the flood.. it's just horrible.. How can they not see this?
M.O.R.
That was the thing. YOU are willing to actually talk and have a discussion what he was doing was dismissing anything he didn't like (by using ANOTHER religious guy to 'disprove' it.) And the preaching that we simply didn't understand his book.
Yeah America sucks right now. Far, FAR to many people being taught that ignorance is a GOOD thing. I still don't get how they can accept some science if it gives them medicine and then reject the same science that says we are related to monkeys or mice. It makes no sense.
I'm hoping that in the future we get some more rational people but something needs to happen to the religious... more education maybe? Unfortunately the religious keep cutting that from schools.
Faboy,
I'm not sure I completely agree with you. If there was no filter then all information would be equal which is not the case. But you might have actually answered that in the next paragraph. For some reason these religious 'leaders' seem to have some sort of override switch. People are lazy so they want to just be told...
But there has to be something that makes what priests and rabbis say more important than say a Doctor or PHD... I'm leaning towards indoctrination myself. You don't question your parents when you are little or other adults, if you are brought up in that atmosphere you will transfer that behavior to the priests, ect. You've taken orders from priest your whole life but you only see a Doctor every now and again... But why continue to do it as an adult? I don't take what my parents say as fact anymore... but I might be a poor example. Hmmmmm...
Best,
Brett
Brett,
When I said no filter, I meant that as far as content goes, you can pretty much write what ever you want and post it on the internet for all to see and read. There's no one saying well this is complete B.S so I'll just delete it from the web so no impressionable young mind can see it and be misled. Nobody wants slippery slope censorship like that.
So what we have out there are kids and adults with poorly developed critical thinking skills, who will readily believe the first interesting idea or concept that comes along, and no one to put it in to perspective for them.
I agree that as a child brought up in a religious environment, you are taught that clergy are wise and you should listen to them. Hell even your parents listen to them so they must know more than even your parents, right?
Beyond that though the message of religion, and Christianity especially, is brilliant in it's simplicity and a great psychological Panacea. People want to hear that they won't really die and that there is a being greater and wiser than they are in control of everything even though evidence is to the contrary.
Chris,
My bad, I might have been skimming. I'm more worried about the active 'war' that the religious have on critical thinking skills. They seem to want to exterminate it. So it's no really poorly developed as it's simply not there.
A fear of death is the most basic fear, but I think most religions are based on that, the Desert ones just seem to take it to a whole new level. They're kind of dicks about it;)
Best,
Brett
I think Kirk Cameron pretty much said it all when he stated that to get a person to believe and have faith in God, you basically have to circumnavigate and get around the persons intelligence.
I don't think Kirk has ever been more right on.
Hey wait, I am a bit slow on the uptake, but did you just diss your former employer, Image?
Wow that is so mean.
For shame Brett, for shame...
Ah well, I understand what you mean.
I know that you say that it is badly written, but that is also down to the egregious editing it went through. I don't know if you ever saw the Tudors, but one of the few elements of the show that were historically accurate, was when it showed King Henry, surrounded by his closest allies and consorts, picking and choosing what they wanted to keep, and what they wanted to lose, from the bible. It also showed the editing and re-interpretation of the content.
But I am only defending the way it was written, just the writing style. In many ways, it was similar to how Jim Shooter would cut and paste panels and script pages from a comic in order to make it how he wanted it to look, without the knowledge of the writers or artists. Sometimes it was better, other times...
Take care Brett.
Post a Comment