Look at the Cosmos, and Compare that with what Christian Apologists Claim to Know for Sure
Do Christian apologists provide definitive answers to questions about the cosmos and humanityʼs place in it? The questions are obvious and based on known scientific data.
Leaving aside for a second the question of God, Jesus, heaven/hell, whom the vast majority do not claim to have seen or heard, letʼs look at the cosmos we can see. It may not only be weird but “weirder than we can imagine” (to quote J. B. S. Haldane). And it appears like we do not come into the cosmos so much as come out of it. In fact complexity appears to be how the cosmos flows, click here.
That being said, it appears like the cosmos might also be viewed as an immense experiment with all this matter and energy in constant flux, shaken endlessly—with incessant birth and death going on in teensy portions of the cosmos like on the quaking surface of our particular rock hurtling through space. Incessant life and death, evolution and extinction, even major extinction events, with the odds of another major asteroid strike or super volcano eruption increasing over time, along with the inevitable aging and inflation of our sunʼs diameter whose solar wind will destabilize our moonʼs orbit causing it to approach the earth too close and explode, raining death from above, an inevitable extinction event.
What I am saying is that the cosmos gives with one hand and takes with the other. At best it is in equilibrium with life and death, evolution and extinction. And it appears that if one wanted to reject the idea of a cosmos weirder than we can imagine but instead wished to posit some transcendent God or Demi urge for its origin, then it appears that about the best one could come up with on the basis of what we know is a Tinkerer of some sort. Judging by all the extinction events, both massive and continual and inevitable in the future, one might even wonder how many cosmoses of different types and sizes this Tinkerer might have tried out before setting up this experiment with this much matter and energy roiling about for billions of years.
As for the human species, it just arrived on the scene in the last cosmic second, and could conceivably be snuffed out the next, and the stars could go on burning for eons more. In fact I read two articles recently that said the cosmos has yet to reach its maximum number of either stars or planets!
Or, conversely, if humanity does survive longer than a cosmic blip and our species gets off the cradle planet and starts spreading throughout the cosmos what will humans look like a billion years in the future? Will those humans look back at us a bit like we look back at Australopithecus? How might genetic and cyber technologies alter our species, or the environmental pressures of having to survive on different planets? Will we use new technologies to uplift other species to human-like levels of sentience, or even find ways to join our sentience with theirs? What will AI be like in future? Maybe humanity is a stepping stone to some future silicon based life forms, or advanced sentient non human species? And so we might be here merely to pass along the torch.
Of course if something like the Carrington Event (massive solar storm from 1859) occurs and a solar flare explodes the worldʼs transformers (luckily the only danger was to telegraph lines back then), our present electronic-based civilization might crumble, since we couldnʼt possibly swap out all the exploded bits and get all the electronics back online even for water pumping or refrigeration in over a year. Same thing if the super volcano in Yellowstone erupts, or antibiotic-resistant microbes continue to evolve.
Does any Christian apologist really imagine he has definitive answers to all such questions, very real questions too, since new stars and planets are indeed continuing to form, and by all astronomical data they have enough fuel to continue to burn for billions of years should humanity take a tumble back toward barbarism or even extinction. Heck, humanity might even evolve into something less cerebral and more ape like. That appears to be yet another possibility.
Also, nature is basically one big buffet. Sometimes they eat you to death, or weaken you to death, sometimes they live off your juices just a little and are relatively benign, and sometimes they produce juices you can eat too (i.e., symbiosis — like the way we breathe the farts of algae and trees). But basically nature is constantly grinding up old organisms and spitting out new ones. How can one be sure what kind of weird ass Designer or Tinkerer came up with such a scheme?
Christian Theology is All Over the Map. Part 2. How Can One Gain Eternal Life? The Synoptic Road to Salvation vs. The Roman Road to Salvation
Many conservative Christians stress the necessity of holding specific beliefs rather than doing and acting certain ways toward others (perhaps because many Christians are taught that holding the right beliefs about God and Jesus and what Jesus accomplished on the cross is what assures them that God will forgive them regardless of their actions, so actions are of lesser consequence than right belief). Some passages in the New Testament appear to present the same view that belief trumps actions when it comes to salvation:
“Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.”
Mark 16:16“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
John 3:16“…that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.”
Romans 10:9-10
Romans 10 contains passages that some Christians have even nicknamed, “The Roman Road to Salvation.”
But looked at another way, one canʼt help but note that Mark 16:16 is not found in the earliest manuscripts of the Gospel of Mark but is part of what textual critics agree is a later added ending. While John 3:16 (from the famous “ye must be born again” dialogue) is a similarly dubious saying attributed to the historical Jesus. To see the case against its historical authenticity click here. As for Paul, he admits he never met the historical Jesus of Nazareth, the one depicted in the synoptic Gospels. Even Paulʼs interpretation of the meaning of Jesusʼs bloody death butts head with that found in Luke-Acts (See Part 1 of this series).
Give such questions, shouldnʼt one look deeper at how Jesus answered the question, “How Can I Inherit Eternal Life?” as seen in the synoptic Gospels (Mark, Matthew and Luke)? In the synoptics Jesusʼs main teaching and concern was “repent for the kingdom of God is at hand.” That was “the Gospel.” And in the synoptics you canʼt fail to notice that Jesus does little to try and get people to agree with specific beliefs “about” himself in order to gain eternal life. Jesus is depicted in the synoptics as advocating an approach to gaining eternal life that did not require outward showy religious displays or numerous rules, nor did he place major value on temple worship and blood sacrifices, instead he laid great stress on oneʼs relationships with others, as in his “Sermon on the Mount” Matt. chapters 5-7.
“In everything, therefore, treat people the same way you want them to treat you, for this is the Law and the Prophets.” Matt. 7:12
Several times in the synoptics Jesus tells people to ‘love God’ and concentrate on storing up ‘heavenly treasures’ by ‘loving others,’ and to ‘follow Jesus’ in that respect:
“Good teacher,” one person asked [Jesus], “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” “Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone. You know the commandments: ‘You shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, you shall not defraud, honor your father and mother.’” “Teacher,” he declared, “all these I have kept since I was a boy.” Jesus looked at him and loved him. “One thing you lack,” he said. “Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” At this the manʼs face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth. Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!”
Mark 10
Or there is the version in Matthew:
“Teacher, what good thing must I do to get eternal life?” “Why do you ask me about what is good?” Jesus replied. “There is only One Who is good. If you want to enter life, keep the commandments.” “Which ones?” he inquired. Jesus replied, “‘You shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, honor your father and mother,’ and ‘love your neighbor as yourself.’” “All these I have kept,” the young man said. “What do I still lack?” Jesus answered, “If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”
Matthew 19
There is also a Lukan version:
“Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” “Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone. You know the commandments: ‘You shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, honor your father and mother.’” “All these I have kept since I was a boy,” he said. When Jesus heard this, he said to him, “You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”
Luke 18
There is this additional teaching about how to gain eternal life that is also found in the synoptics:
“‘The most important one [commandment],’ answered Jesus, ‘is this: Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one, Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these.’ ‘Well said, teacher,’ the man replied. ‘You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.’ When Jesus saw that he had answered wisely, he said to him, ‘You are not far from the kingdom of God.’”
Mark 12“A lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, ‘Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?’ He [Jesus] said to him, ‘What is written in the law? How do you read?’ And he answered, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.’ And he [Jesus] said to him, ‘You have answered right; do this, and you will live.’”
Luke 10:25-28
Such teachings emphasize “doing” in relation to “how to gain eternal life.” This is not to say that Paul in Romans, nor the author of the Gospel of John, lack similar sayings, for they wrote:
“[God] will render to every man according to his deeds, to them who by patient continuance in well doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, eternal life….”
Romans 2:6,7“And shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.”
John 5
But, unlike the synoptics, Paul and the author of the fourth Gospel also have interpretations of who Jesus was that they tie up with their salvation messages:
“He who believes not [that Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world] is damned already.”
John 3“For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth… the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe… whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood…”
Romans 1:18; 3:22,25
But is blood sacrifice necessary for salvation? Jesus in the synoptics did not seem to think so when he instructed people to pray like this for forgiveness:
“Father… forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.” Matt. 6:12
“Father… forgive us our sins, for we also forgive everyone who sins against us.” Luke 11:4
Jesus in the synoptics taught that people who forgave the debts/sins of others would be forgiven by God without need of a blood sacrifice.
To sum matters up once again, as previously noted, Jesus is depicted as saying in Matthew:
“in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.”
Matthew 7:12
If that sums up the Law and the Prophets, what need is there for much more to be said?
Or consider the parable of The Good Samaritan found in Luke, that ends, “Go and do likewise.” Luke 10
Go and do. Doing is the main thing. Along with Godʼs direct and ample forgiveness regardless of oneʼs specific beliefs ‘about’ Jesus. In fact according to the Gospel of Luke one of the two thieves on the cross next to Jesus called Jesus ‘a man,’ but Jesus still promised him paradise.
Christian Theology is All Over the Map. Part 1. Must Christians believe that Jesus's bloody death had atoning power?
What did the author of Luke-Acts believe about the doctrine known as ‘the atonement?’ “There is at present no satisfactory consensus reached regarding the presentation of the death of Jesus in Luke-Acts. Many models have been proposed, but none seem to deal adequately with all that is going on in Luke-Acts.” See, the diversity of opinion in The Atonement in Lucan Theology in Recent Discussion Some argue that the Lucan Jesus is presented as an innocent martyr, righteous, or lowly man, or that Jesusʼs death was simply a means toward resurrection.
“Many scholars see no atoning significance in the Gospel of Lukeʼs presentation of the death of Jesus and no connection with the forgiveness of sins. There are three passion predictions (9:22; 9:44; 18:31-3), but nothing corresponding to the ‘ransom’ saying in Mark 10:45 and Matthew 20:28, and no ‘cry of dereliction’ from the cross in Luke 23. Even the citations from Isaiah 53 in Luke 22:37 and Acts 8:32-3 are said to demonstrate that Luke is interested ‘not in the atoning death of Jesus but in the fulfillment of scripture in the obedient passion (silence), death (humiliation), and resurrection (taking up from the earth) of the Servant.’” per David Peterson, Atonement in the Synoptic Gospels, who cites Conzelmann, H., The Theology of St. Luke, (trans. G. Buswell; New York: Harper & Row, 1960), 200-1; and, Sylva, D. D. (ed.), Reimaging the Death of the Lukan Jesus (Frankfurt: Anton Hain, 1990) which records a variety of ways in which the death of Jesus in Luke-Acts has been understood; and, Sylva, Reimaging, 146. In ‘Atonement Theology in Luke-Acts: Some Methodological Reflections,’ in P. J. Williams, A. D. Clarke, P. M. Head, D. Instone-Brewer (ed.), The New Testament in its First Century Setting (Grand Rapids/Cambridge: Eerdmans), 56-71.Consider the Gospel of Luke where the author mentions that John the Baptist gave his people the knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of sins because of Godʼs tender mercy (Luke 1:76-78), adding that the Baptist preached a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins (Luke 3:2-4); and the Gospel of Luke ends the same way, by stating that “repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in his [Jesusʼs] name to all nations” (Luke 24:46-48), but nothing about the atoning power of Jesusʼs blood sacrifice. Same with the prayer Jesus taught others to pray per Matthew and Luke, the ‘Our Father,’ that mentions God granting forgiveness to those who forgive others, i.e., without God requiring a blood sacrifice before forgiving sins.)
Scholars point out that the author of Luke-Acts neglected to reproduce crucial verses found in Mark//Matthew that describe Jesusʼ death as a ‘ransom.’ Luke reproduces much of Mark in his gospel, including material from immediately before and immediately after the passage below, but omits this particular passage:
“For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
Mark 10:45 / Matt 20:28
Also, Luke 22:19-20 says “And he took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, ‘This is my body given for you; do this in remembrance of me.’” In the same way, after the supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you.” But some manuscripts only have “And he took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, ‘This is my body.’” that is, they lack the bit about a “new covenant in my blood poured out for you.”
Bart Ehrman in “The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture,” makes a compelling case for why the shorter reading is the original. And this is the only passage in Luke that suggests Jesusʼ shed blood had magical atoning power.
Similar to the case found in the Gospel of Luke only a single passage in Acts suggests Jesusʼ shed blood has atoning power:
“Keep watch over yourselves and all the flock of which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers. Be shepherds of the church of God, which he bought with his own blood.” Acts 20:28
That is the only verse in Acts that suggests that Jesusʼ shed blood has atoning power, and much like the verse in Luke, there is a good case to be made that these words were not part of the original.
Without Luke 22:19b-20 and Acts 20:28 there is no concept of blood atonement in Luke-Acts. When Jesus died, according to Luke, it wasnʼt in place of sinners or on their behalf, instead, one need only repent and be baptized in most cases, to accept Godʼs direct mercy.
So if one need only repent and be baptized what is the cross about according to Luke-Acts?
Letʼs have a look at the preaching of Peter and Paul in Acts.
Peter preaches the following in Acts 2, Jesus was a man sent by God. We know he was sent by God because of the miracles. According to Godʼs plan he was killed. God raised him to life. God made him Lord and Messiah. God gave him the Holy Spirit, which he now pours out on his followers. In order to get the Spirit you need to repent and be baptized in Jesusʼs name. Peterʼs message is that forgiveness comes through repentance and baptism and then you get the Holy Spirit.
In Acts 3, Peter preaches that forgiveness comes through repentance and baptism isnʼt mentioned.
In Acts 4, Peterʼs message to the Sanhedrin is that salvation is found in Jesus, but this appears linked to his exalted current status, not to his death.
In Acts 5, Peterʼs words suggest that God exalted Jesus the role of savior after his resurrection, so it was neither the death or resurrection that has saving power, but rather Jesusʼs current exalted status.
In Acts 7 Stephenʼs preaching does not include a ‘gospel’ message, but it is clear that it is the power of the risen Jesus that matters.
In Acts 8, the topic is how you get the Holy Spirit. Again, this seems to be the objective of preaching in Acts.
In Acts 10, Peter preaches to Cornelius, informing him that what God did to Jesus after his ascension is what matters, and believing in the risen Jesus is the way to receive the Holy Spirit.
In Acts 13 Paul preaches the same message, namely that Jesus was a good man, wrongly killed, vindicated by God, raised, and then made Son of God and Savior.
In Acts 17 Paul basically repeats his message in Acts 13.
The preaching of the apostles in Acts repeats the same basic message, Jesus was a good man, wrongly killed. He was vindicated by God and raised from the dead. He became the Son of God and Savior. He can forgive the sins of the repentant and send the Holy Spirit.
Therefore, scholars have noted that a blood atonement is not the major focus of preaching in Acts. It might not be the focus at all in fact if two questionable passages that mention the ‘blood’ are later additions, as textual scholars suspect they are.
The gospel message in Luke-Acts is this: repent, be baptized in the name of Jesus and receive the Holy Spirit.
To add to the above case, note that Luke 19:19ff (NASB), talks about ‘salvation’ coming to Zaccheus after he repents and returns ill gotten gains. This understanding of salvation precedes Jesusʼ death on the cross, and as in every other case mentioned differs from the traditional Christian view that “without shedding of blood there can be no forgiveness of sins.” It also differs from the story of the rich young man in which Jesus told him to give away all of his possessions that he might have treasure in heaven and how difficult it was for a rich man to enter heaven, since Zaccheus only gives away half of what he owns, not all, and still, ‘salvation’ is his. Hereʼs the story in Luke 19:
He [Jesus] entered Jericho and was passing through. 2 And there was a man called by the name of Zaccheus; he was a chief tax collector and he was rich. 3 Zaccheus was trying to see who Jesus was, and was unable because of the crowd, for he was small in stature. [The Greek is ambiguous as to whether or not Zaccheus or Jesus was ‘small in stature,’ though the former is probably meant, though if the latter is meant, it would be the only time in the New Testament where some description of the physical Jesus is presented. Though like I said, it is probably just talking about Zaccheus.] 4 So he ran on ahead and climbed up into a sycamore tree in order to see Him, for He was about to pass through that way. 5 When Jesus came to the place, He looked up and said to him, “Zaccheus, hurry and come down, for today I must stay at your house.” 6 And he hurried and came down and received Him gladly. 7 When they saw it, they all began to grumble, saying, “He has gone to be the guest of a man who is a sinner.” 8 Zaccheus stopped and said to the Lord, “Behold, Lord, half of my possessions I will give to the poor, and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will give back four times as much.” 9 And Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because he, too, is a son of Abraham. 10 For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.”
Nor does the passage demonstrate that everyone is “lost,” nor do these other Gospel passages:
“And when Jesus heard it, he said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick; I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.“ Mark 2:17
“But when he heard it, he said, ‘Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. Go and learn what this means, “I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.’” For I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.” Matthew 9.12-13
“And Jesus answered them, ‘Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick; I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.’” Luke 5:31-32
In fact Jesus in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke does not say everyoneʼs heart is evil and wicked above all things, but rather states:
“A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him.” Matthew 12:35
“A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.” Luke 6:45
Jesus also says to “love God with all your heart” which seems impossible if the heart can will only evil choices and is desperately wicked in everyone at all times.
Moreover, the Bible is a big book and you can find passages that put forth the notion that God does not require blood atonement sacrifices because sometimes grain sacrifices are fine, but even more to the point are passages where God directly forgives people who repent. Such passages state outright that repentance and doing good takes the utmost precedence above all types of sacrifices, so at best atonement sacrifices are secondary in Godʼs eyes:
“For I desire mercy, not sacrifice, and acknowledgment of God rather than burnt offerings.” Hosea 6:6
“He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.” Micah 6:8
“Hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom; listen to the instruction of our God, you people of Gomorrah! “The multitude of your sacrifices—what are they to me?” says the Lord. ‘I have more than enough of burnt offerings, of rams and the fat of fattened animals; I have no pleasure in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats. When you come to appear before me, who has asked this of you, this trampling of my courts? Stop bringing meaningless offerings! Your incense is detestable to me. New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations—I cannot bear your worthless assemblies. Your New Moon feasts and your appointed festivals I hate with all my being. They have become a burden to me; I am weary of bearing them. When you spread out your hands in prayer, I hide my eyes from you; even when you offer many prayers, I am not listening. Your hands are full of blood!’” Isaiah 1:10-15
“Hear, you earth: I am bringing disaster on this people, the fruit of their schemes, because they have not listened to my words and have rejected my law. What do I care about incense from Sheba or sweet calamus from a distant land? Your burnt offerings are not acceptable; your sacrifices do not please me.” Jeremiah 6:19-21
Or, to quote Jesus himself…
“In everything, therefore, treat people the same way you want them to treat you, for this is the Law and the Prophets.”
Matthew 7:12
Thatʼs it. Sounds pretty straightforward, not like the the merry-go-round of questions Christian theologians continue to debate, involving questions like, “Do I have enough faith, love, devotion, correct beliefs, etc.” How much and how fervently and exactly what must I believe in order to be saved? How many doubts and questions can I continue to harbor and remain “saved?” etc. Also see Part 2 of this series.
Agnosticism compared with Religion (or compared with any other fully formed belief system)
I figure there are many good people in every mass movement or belief system, but that systems requiring the highest levels of conformity tend to create difficulties for people with questions like myself, and that people devoted to sustaining each system will employ plenty of rationalizations to convince themselves of its purity and truth and never consider that the evidence may be lacking or ambiguous in many cases.
I am sure any apologetically minded Christian could produce a list of their favorite books defending their Protestant, Catholic, Pentecostal or other beliefs, and questioning every other point of view. But why didnʼt God show everyone the truth and keep Christians together? Why so many divisions and questions rather than agreed upon answers? I guess Satan is blinding everybody on all sides. Or as Benjamin Franklin once put it (without reference to Satan):
“Every other sect supposes itself in possession of the truth, and that those who differ are so far in the wrong. Like a man travelling in foggy weather they see those at a distance before them wrapped up in a fog, as well as those behind them, and also people in the fields on each side; but near them, all appears clear, though in truth they are as much in the fog as any of them.”
Personally, I tend to think of humans as primates with the tendency to leap on bandwagons and follow alpha males/females. I also agree with Eric Hoffer when it comes to humansʼ desires to join their egos to mass movements, whether such mass movements be Christian, Muslim, fascist or communist. Hofferʼs works contain some brilliant insights into the similar psychological drives that animate adherents of mass movements. As he put it, “The less justified a man is in claiming excellence for his own self, the more ready is he to claim all excellence for his nation, his religion, his race or his holy cause.” For more quotations click here.
And to expand upon Franklinʼs “they are as much in the fog as any of them” story, one need only read the testimonies of those who questioned and/or left Protestantism (click here) or Catholicism (click here) after being devoted to one or the other for decades.
Or one can read books by others who have found that like all mass movements that become institutionalized, the larger the institution the more willing it seems to make deals with the devil to retain its institutionalized existence, i.e., in the case of Catholicism such deals have been made with fascist rulers, or to keep silent concerning abuses perpetrated by members of the institution, or even deals with bankers and the Mafia, etc. (click here).
I also find that people who idolize figures in history or who idolize institutions usually donʼt know very much about them, or arenʼt willing to look at whatʼs swept under the rug so to speak, including Jesusʼs and Paulʼs apocalyptic soon final judgment predictions and cult-like teachings. Check out the new book, The Bad Jesus: The Ethics of New Testament Ethics (click here).
And check out my posts on the characteristics of Paul that strike me as indicative of cult-like behavior (click here and here).
Not to mention my older piece, The Lowdown of Godʼs Showdown.
The great irony of Christianity is that it consists of too many schisms to mention, including conservative, moderate, liberal spectrums of differences within each major denomination, yet ‘Christianity’ or rather ‘Christianities’ claims more supernatural advantages than any other movement on earth. Believers claim to possess the only inspired writings on earth, and a prayer hotline by which they may ask and receive guidance from God to lead them into all truth, and a new heart implanted inside them via divine favor=grace. Yet they have come up with countless schisms and centuries of defending intolerant and even in some cases unscientific points of view. I am not saying religion has not also done good, nor should believers deny that non-Christian doctors, inventors and politicians have also done good. You donʼt have to be a Christian to do good. My point is that Christians claim humongous supernatural advantages over every other mass movement and belief system, yet when you look at the history of Christianity it is the history of schisms too numerous to mention.
And for over 1000 years when a devout Christian (or a large majority of Christians) ruled over a city, country or nation, they instituted laws against blasphemy, heresy, witchcraft, etc., and continued to do so for centuries, from the days of the Christian Roman Emperors that later of whom wound up declaring in their famous book of law that all non-Trinitarians were ‘demented’ and that the Emperor would punish them and destroy their writings, all the way to the days of the Reformation when the same was still occurring.
Augustine of Hippo set forth the principle of Cognite Intrare (‘Compel them to enter,’ based on Luke 14:23). Cognite Intrare would be used throughout the Middle Ages to justify the Churchʼs suppression of dissent and oppression of difference (click here).
Christian persecution of pagans—exceeded the pagan persecution of early Christians (click here)
Christian persecution of fellow Christians—exceeded the pagan persecution of early Christians (click here)
Reformation Christian persecution of fellow Christians—exceeded the pagan persecution of early Christians (click here)
Christian persecution of American Indians—exceeded the pagan persecution of early Christians (click here)
Decrees of Christian Emperors against non-Trinitarians (click here and scroll to bottom of blogpost)
Protestant and Catholic defenses of the necessity of persecuting heretics, blasphemers, infidels, etc. (click here)
Life is confusing enough, and features enough daily disappointments and pains, and requires enough time and work obtaining necessities to exist or thrive (not to mention that we humans can seemingly get sidetracked or addicted to nearly any idea, behaviors or items, due to our large brains) that I figure most people are apt to lend their allegiance to all sorts of mass movements and belief systems. But to imagine a God tossing us primates into a place of eternal punishment—without even giving us a second chance after we have finally been shown a literal heaven, hell and angels after we have died, and without even lending a supernatural hand to heal the scars left on our psyches from life on earth, or without even lending a hand to to glue together into more meaningful focus our broken scattered painful memories from life on earth, and after only allowing each of us this brief stint of a few decades years of life or less in a ‘fallen’ cosmos—makes little sense to me. Everlasting punishment makes little sense. What does make sense to me is to honestly admit that things we donʼt know are things we donʼt know, and that confusing or ambiguous evidence is confusing or ambiguous evidence, i.e., without trying to make excuses to fill in such blanks or hazy knowledge with fully formed religious or philosophical belief systems.
Miracles by Craig S. Keener — “Inability to walk?” No. “Improved Ability to Walk?” Temporarily
Craig S. Keener wrote in his book, “Miracles: The Credibility of the New Testament Accounts” (2 Volume Set), Baker Academic, 2011:
David Friedrich Strauss (1808-74) [author of The Life of Jesus Critically Examined] explained early Christian miracle stories as myths depicted as history… Interestingly, Strauss did hear of contemporary miracle claims involving Lutheran pastor Johann Christoph Blumhardt, and a friend of his found himself cured of inability to walk after visiting Blumhardt. Consistent with his worldview, however, Strauss apparently dismissed the friendʼs cure as psychosomatic.
Keener makes it sound like Straussʼs friend was incapable of walking, i.e., “inability to walk.” But no source I checked said that, not even Isingʼs book that Keener cited as his primary source. So Keener provides a perfect example of miracle enhancement in his summary retelling, or at the very least he has left it to his readers to imagine a worst case scenario of someone with no ability to walk. But that was not the case at all as we will see. Nor did the “cure” last.
The friend of D. F. Strauss who visited Blumhardt was the German romantic poet and pastor, Eduard Morike, see photo below. All three men knew each other in their youth.
According to the book by Ising that Keener footnotes, “Morike can walk only with difficulty.” He did not lack the ability to walk. Ising also adds:
Morike was planning on a treatment by ‘magnetizing’—that is, the stroking of hands on the head with inducement to hypnotic sleep, otherwise known as ‘mesmerizing,’ a form of hypnotism to help relieve pain. Blumhardt told Morike that magnetizing was harmful. Later that evening, when Blumhardt accompanies Morike to his lodging Morike says that he senses more strength in his body than usual. Blumhardt smiles. “There is something special in the Mottlingen air; he should remain with Blumhardt here; no where else will he find it better.” The weakness in his backbone that is seen as the cause of his walking difficulties disappears. Morike leaves Mottlingen and Blumhardt to visit hot springs in Bad Teinach for his rhematic pain but returns once again to see Blumhardt, and reports to Wilhelm Hartlaub that now he is able to go on mountain hikes in burning heat. But his improvement does not last. In Feb. 1850 rhematic complaints reappear; in June 1850 he tries a Mergentheim water cure to relieve arthritic pains in his feet and legs. Source: Johann Christoph Blumhardt, Life and Work: A New Biography by Dieter Ising and Monty Ledford
Another scholarly source tells the story this way:
[Eduard] Morike had back pain and limb numbness. At the end of his weekend with his old friend pastor Blumhardt he received a parting prayer and laying on of hands and soon exuded such energy that physicians believed Morike a healthy man for nearly a year. The two friends, however, viewed the healing less a ‘miracle’ than a ‘gift’ symbolizing Morikeʼs return to faith after a period of doubt…
The cure stories at [Blumhardtʼs church] are not extraordinary for their pronouncement of miraculous causes, located as they are in a century of ecstatic camp meetings, urban revivals and Marian apparitions…
[The accounts of healings at Blumhardtʼs church] illuminate… the significance that each of the actors [in the healing stories] attached to the rituals before participating in them. Blumhardt and his penitents approached the confession expecting a profound religious experience. Hence, while there are reports of laymen who expected a sensation that never arrived, there are none to my knowledge of those who were caught unaware…
Blumhardtʼs miracles… bolstered the devotion of thousands to the promises of the revival while planting seeds of interest in thousands more, the majority never cured of anything… [And] the exodus of pilgrims from neighboring villages brought the ire of fellow pastors, and stern admonitions… from the consistory in Stuttgart who ordered Blumhardt “to direct the foreigners to the means of edification that are available in their hometowns.”
SOURCE: Daniel Kohler, “Pilgrimage of Protestants: Miracles and Religious Community in J. C. Blumhardtʼs Wurttemberg, 1840-1880,” a chapter in Die Gegenwart Gottes in der Modernen Gesellschaft: Transzendenz und Religiose Vergemeinschaftung in Deutschland / The Presence of God in Modern Society: Transcendence and Religious Community in Germany (German) 2006 by Michael Geyer, Lucian Holscher.
Another source notes that “His [Morikeʼs] health never improved sufficiently to allow him more than a few hours of productivity for weeks or months at a time… His own illness caused him constant pain, and his death on June 4, 1875 was not unexpected.” In context the source reads:
[Morike] was subject to rheumatic pains and eye trouble, and in 1823 we hear of an undefined ‘weakness in the chest.’ Today we could venture the hypothesis that he was suffering from the aftereffects of scarlet fever, but at his time medicine was not advanced enough to make such a diagnosis… Patiently he tried to show her that it would be wiser to wait for a parish in a climate beneficial to his health [in the mid 1800s there was no pollution control but plenty of smoke stacks spewing black smoke as industrialization took off as well as a lack of proper sanitation in cities making people not want to take a deep breath due to the stink, nor were houses easily climate controlled but still employed fire or coal burning systems and lacked air conditioning, so moving to a different clime could indeed aid a personʼs health]… In the meantime, the old struggle with his poor health and his antipathy to preaching also continued in these outwardly idyllic years… In November 1842, his superiors gave him the choice of either doing his work without help or going into retirement on a very low pension. Morike chose retirement; and at thirty-nine he moved with his sister to the spa of Schwabisch-Hall to take the [therapeutic/healing] waters and then at that end of 1844, when the climate still proved too harsh, to Bad Mergentheim… [he was] a poet whose nerves reacted to the slightest change in atmosphere, which he so beautifully depicted in his poetry… It seems tragic, then, that he gained his freedom too late to enjoy it, since his health never improved sufficiently to allow him more than a few hours of productivity for weeks or months at a time… Morke married Margarete November 25, 1851, after they had known each other for seven years. The courtship [that began around 1845] put an end to the two yearsʼ silence of Morikeʼs poetic genius just after his retirement. The years after 1845 were very fruitful ones for the poet… But his happy home life began to show signs of strain as the poet and his wife became older. Gretchen had always been a very sensitive person and took her illnesses just as seriously as the poet took his… His own illness caused him constant pain, and his death on June 4, 1875 was not unexpected.
Source: Eduard Morike by Helga Slessarev, University of Cincinnati (New York: Twayne Publishers 1970)
Also, as Ising admits, Blumhardt “does not cover up the fact that there are disappointments; not everybody experiences healing. Among these are people with ‘black star’ [cataracts] or those with congenital blindness or deafness… his prayer also seems ineffective for his mother-in-law.”
Is it any surprise that D. F. Strauss was not impressed when he heard of Morikeʼs “cure” at Blumfeldtʼs church?
Morike at the time of his temporary ‘healing’ was also engaged to a young lady he was excited about marrying, so Strauss added in a letter that it was probably not Blumhardt who cured Morike but “the god of love [Cupid?], who alone clearly delivered [Morike]…”
And Be Sure To Follow The Continuing Review Of Keenerʼs Book On Miracles By Matthew Ferguson Here.
Why Abiogenesis Is Not Inconceivable
There is plenty of evidence from geology and cosmology that organic chemicals form naturally in space, and on some planets and moons and probably inside the watery heart of comets, as well as having formed on the ancient earth. There is also evidence that the earliest fossils are from single-celled organisms. But we donʼt have fossils that allow us a peek at the internal structures of the earliest replicators, to study and compare their chemical structures and trajectories over the three to four billion years when only single celled organisms existed on earth, i.e. not like the way we can study and compare the fossilized remains of vertebrates (animals with backbones) throughout geologic time. So investigating the question of abiogenesis leaves us with a far wider range of possible variables to consider and experimentally study and compare, and more hypotheses.
Let me add that the cosmos contains at least two trillion galaxies per 2017 data. Furthermore, if the inflation model is true then there are more galaxies out there that we canʼt see/detect, lying further out in the darkness than the ones we can see/detect. Also, the universe features energies and atoms mixing and remixing in far more ‘experiments’ than any origin of life lab. So who knows what mixes might not lead to what?
The cosmos itself is a great mystery since we have nothing to compare it to, and since it seems to naturally lead to more complexity and differentiation as it cools down from the Big Bang. As the cosmos cooled, hydrogen and helium atoms formed, and stars, and then as the stars aged they turned those two basic elements into all the rest, and this occurred naturally, as even creationists admit. So given elements naturally forming from simpler more basic elements, and then with further cooling those elements attaching to one another in simple organic molecular forms, why would anyone be averse to trying to discover how some of those organic molecules might have formed self-replicating chains of molecules?
We even know from experiments that a small chain of RNA can replicate itself given some organic building blocks and a little zinc as a catalyst, no proteins needed, happens naturally.
Let me add that the odds of one PARTICULAR self-replicating molecule forming (like creationists and I.Dʼists calculate, such as a particular arrangement of RNA or DNA or a particular protein like hemoglobin) has much less to do with the odds of some self-replicating molecules forming somewhere via some natural interactions in a cosmos as huge as this one—the latter appears to defy calculation.
Also, the question of whether we are alone in the cosmos, or whether life of a simple sort exists elsewhere, or whether intelligent life exists elsewhere, are all good questions to which we donʼt know the answer. But then, our species has barely just arrived on the cosmic scene, and we remain on the cradle planet, we havenʼt investigated the rest of our own solar system let alone the galaxy and the cosmos.
Also, our telescopes are viewing galaxies and planets from the cosmic past, i.e., we are looking at the light from galaxies that began its journey to our planet millions to billions of years ago. So we canʼt see what is happening NOW on the vast majority of galaxies and planets out there. We canʼt even see planets outside of those circling stars nearest our own star in this one tiny portion of this one galaxy.
Also, astronomers note that the cosmos has not yet reached its maximum of stars and planets! Stars and planets are still forming! And there will be more of them in the future than at present. So we canʼt say what will be going on or not going on then.
Stellar nurseries in some portions of the cosmos are still pumping out stars. Stars will continue being born (and then reborn from the remnants of exploded stars) for tens of billions of years to come. Will the human species still be around tens of billions of years to come? If it survives then will it survive in the same form as it is now? It seems a real possibility that the human species may become extinct with so much energy and matter continually moving around. I can easily imagine a cosmos without humans—with stars burning silently for tens of billions of years as even creationists admit is the lifetime of stars since even creationist astronomers admit the evidence of fusion taking place inside stars is clear, and such a process would take a couple billion years to complete for the majority of stars.
And the lifetime of black holes is a hundred billion years or more since they decay via emitting tiny amounts of Hawking radiation.
Also, a “huge” amount of “non-biotic organic materials” covering the whole earth is not necessary according to some hypotheses, only the gradual accumulation of some biotic materials in some regions of the earth. One such hypothesis is based on the fact that tiny holes form in rocks deep undersea near thermal vents. Beyond the tiny holes are hollowed out regions within the rock where organic materials can accumulate in two-dimensional fashion clinging to the inside of the hollowed out rock.
Matthew Pocock adds, “Personally Iʼm liking the thermal vent idea. Some of the core chemistry of the cell is suspiciously similar to that within the matrix of the rock in these vents.”
And see this fascinating video
Christians Say the Damnedest Things… about Hell and Faith
Augustine of Hippo Refuting Heretic |
Augustine on the Eternal Joy that Comes From Seeing What Is Happening in Hell
Augustine was the first Christian theologian to write a biblical defense of the view that the lost will suffer forever in hell. If youʼre familiar with the way that previous church fathers — even those who believed in eternal torment — wrote, youʼll recognize that this is something new. This was almost a systematic case for eternal torment, and due to its length (compared with anything that had come before) and Augustineʼs major influence, it became the standard. It took some time for dissenters to again be heard with any significant volume against this backdrop. See Augustineʼs City of God (written soon after the year 410) Book 21.
The New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia repeats some of Augustineʼs arguments when it points out:
The Holy Bible is quite explicit in teaching the eternity of the pains of hell. The torments of the damned shall last forever and ever (Revelation 14:11; 19:3; 20:10). They are everlasting just as are the joys of heaven (Matthew 25:46). Of Judas, Christ says: “it were better for him, if that man had not been born” (Matthew 26:24). But this would not have been true if Judas was ever to be released from hell and admitted to eternal happiness. Again, God says of the damned: “Their worm shall not die, and their fire shall not be quenched” (Isaiah 66:24; Mark 9:43, 45, 47). The fire of hell is repeatedly called eternal and unquenchable. The wrath of God abideth on the damned (John 3:36); they are vessels of Divine wrath (Romans 9:22); they shall not possess the Kingdom of God (1 Corinthians 6:10; Galatians 5:21), etc.
Source
But Augustine went even further. He taught that the memories of the redeemed in the future kingdom of God will be not only supernaturally maintained but enhanced such that they retain all the knowledge of their past sufferings on earth as well as knowledge of the eternal sufferings of the lost in hell, because only by carrying such knowledge around with them for eternity can they truly appreciate what their own salvation means. Otherwise at some point in eternity they might forget what they were saved from, and not remain eternally grateful to God.
To quote Augustine,
…their intellectual knowledge, which shall be great, shall keep them acquainted not only with their own past woes, but with the eternal sufferings of the lost. For if they were not to know that they had been miserable, how could they, as the Psalmist says, forever sing the mercies of God? (Psalm 89:1)… Those who shall be in torment shall not know what is going on within in the joy of the Lord; but they who shall enter into that joy shall know what is going on outside in the outer darkness.
Source 1 and Source 2
Later Christian writers would expand on Augustineʼs point but it was now new. In The Apocalypse of Peter the saved witness the torments of the damned. In the Gospel of Nicodemus, those about to be rescued watch Christ throw the wicked into the pit, Tartarus. Earlier still, there were passages in the Bible that depict something similar. You can skip to the end of this post to read them.
Thomas Aquinas would later argue, based on similar premises, to a conclusion similar to Augustineʼs. Keep in mind such a view became one of the hallmarks of Christianity as supported by some of Christianityʼs leading thinkers as we will see below.
Source
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Triumph of St. Thomas Aquinas [center] over the Heretics. |
Thomas Aquinas on the Eternal Joy that Comes From Seeing Perfectly the Sufferings of the Damned
According to Aquinas the blessed will not pity the unhappiness of the damned. For we choose to have compassion when we wish the suffering of others to stop, and so when we do not wish their suffering to stop, we have no such compassion. Since it is impossible to stop the suffering of the damned, and because it would in any case be contrary to Divine justice, the blessed will have no compassion for them.
Aquinas goes even further, arguing via logical propositions that we will see the damned suffering and we will rejoice:
Nothing should be denied the blessed that belongs to the perfection of their beatitude. Now everything is known the more for being compared with its contrary, because when contraries are placed beside one another they become more conspicuous. Wherefore in order that the happiness of the saints may be more delightful to them and that they may render more copious thanks to God for it, they are allowed to see perfectly the sufferings of the damned… The saints will rejoice in the punishment of the wicked, by considering therein the order of Divine justice and their own deliverance, which will fill them with joy. And thus the Divine justice and their own deliverance will be the direct cause of the joy of the blessed: while the punishment of the damned will cause it indirectly.
Source
Martin Luther on the Acme or Highest Degree of Faith
Martin Luther admitted that he could not comprehend how this God can be merciful and just who displays so much wrath and iniquity and added that Godʼs goodness appears hidden, hence the need for faith of the highest degree:
God hides his eternal goodness and mercy under eternal wrath, his righteousness under iniquity. This is the highest degree of faith, to believe him merciful when he saves so few and damns so many, and to believe him righteous when by his own will he makes us necessarily damnable, so that he seems, according to Erasmus, to delight in the torments of the wretched and to be worthy of hatred rather than of love. If, then, I could by any means comprehend how this God can be merciful and just who displays so much wrath and iniquity, there would be no need of faith. As it is, since that cannot be comprehended, there is room for the exercise of faith when such things are preached and published, just as when God kills, the faith of life is exercised in death.
The Bondage of the Will, 1525
Luther praised the love of God that might even damn him to hell, and declared in The Bondage of the Will, “God himself does evil through those who are evil.”
Martin E. Marty, “Martin Luther: A Life”
John Calvin on Godʼs “Dreadful Decree”
I again ask how it is that the fall of Adam involves so many nations with their infant children in eternal death without remedy unless that it so seemed meet to God? Here the most loquacious tongues must be dumb. The decree, I admit, is, dreadful; and yet it is impossible to deny that God foreknow what the end of man was to be before he made him, and foreknew, because he had so ordained by his decree. Should any one here inveigh against the prescience of God, he does it rashly and unadvisedly. For why, pray, should it be made a charge against the heavenly Judge, that he was not ignorant of what was to happen? Thus, if there is any just or plausible complaint, it must be directed against predestination.
Institutes of the Christian Religion Book 3, Sec. 23, 7
Speaking of this passage, nineteenth century Reformed theologian, Dr. H. J. Van Dyke, admitted:
Now let us be candid with ourselves, and even with our opponents. Historic Calvinism does include what Calvin himself calls the horribile decretum, that by the election and predestination of God many nations, with their infant children, are irretrievably doomed to eternal death.
“Variations within Calvinism,” pp.39-40
In similar fashion Calvin wrote:[When it comes to Godʼs honor] He banishes all those human affections which soften our hearts; that he commands paternal love and all the benevolent feelings between brothers, relations, and friends to cease; in a word, that He almost deprives men of their nature in order that nothing may hinder their holy zeal. Why is so implacable a severity exacted but that we may know that God is defrauded of His honor, unless the piety that is due to Him be preferred to all human duties, and that when His glory is to be asserted, humanity must be almost obliterated from our memories?
Source
God makes plain that the false prophet is to be stoned without mercy. We are to crush beneath our heel all affections of nature when His honor is involved.
Calvinʼs comment on Deuteronomy 13:
Let us also learn that nothing is less consistent than to punish heavily the crimes whereby mortals are injured, whilst we connive at the impious errors or sacrilegious modes of worship whereby the majesty of God is violated.
Calvinʼs comment on Exodus 32:29
One should forget all mankind when His glory is in question. God does not even allow whole towns and populations to be spared, but will have the walls razed and the memory of the inhabitants destroyed and all things ruined as a sign of His utter detestation, lest the contagion spread.
Defense of Orthodox Faith against the Prodigious Errors of the Spaniard Michael Servetus, published in early 1554.
Jonathan Edwards on Rejoicing Even if Oneʼs Wife, Children or Closest Friends Wind Up In Eternal Hell
Quote from Jonathan Edwards, The Life of David Brainerd about a womanʼs depth of faith:
This woman has discovered a very sweet and heavenly frame of mind… Discovering an unusual joy and satisfaction in her countenance… I inquired into the reason of it [and] she replied that God had made her feel that ‘twas right for him to do what he pleased with all things; and that ‘twould be right if he should cast her husband and son both into hell; and she saw ‘twas so right for God to do what he pleased with them, that she could not but rejoice if God should send them into hell, though ‘twas apparent she loved them dearly.
More great words of faith:
You that have godly parents… You will see them with a holy joyfulness in their countenances, and with songs in their mouths. When they shall see you turned away and beginning to enter into the great furnace, and shall see how you shrink at it, and hear how you shriek and cry out; yet they will not be at all grieved for you, but at the same time you will hear from them renewed praises and hallelujahs for the true and righteous judgments of God, in so dealing with you… After they shall have seen you lie in hell thousands of years, and your torment shall yet continue without any rest, day or night; they will not begin to pity you then; they will praise God, that his justice appears in the eternity of your misery… singing the more joyful for the glorious justice of God which they behold in your eternal condemnation. [The last sentence was from earlier in the same essay].
Jonathan Edwards,“The Ungodly Warned”When the saints in glory… shall see how miserable others of their fellow-creatures are, who were naturally in the same circumstances with themselves; when they shall see the smoke of their torment, and the raging of the flames of their burning, and hear their dolorous shrieks and cries, and consider that they [the saints] in the mean time are in the most blissful state and shall surely be in it to all eternity; how will they rejoice!
Jonathan Edwards 1834, sec. II)
Famed Hymn Writer, Isaac Watts, “Thy Just Revenge Adore”
Thy hand shall on rebellious kings
A fiery tempest pour,
While we beneath thy sheltʼring wings
Thy just revenge adore.
[Book 1 Hymn 42]
There endless crowds of sinners lie,
And darkness makes their chains;
Tortured with keen despair they cry,
Yet wait for fiercer pains.
Not all their anguish and their blood
For their old guilt atones,
Nor the compassion of a God
Shall hearken to their groans.
[Book 2, Hymn 2]
Lord, I ascribe it to thy grace,
And not to chance as others do,
That I was born of Christian race,
And not a heathen, or a Jew.
[Divine and Moral Songs, Song 6, Praise for the Gospel]
Quotations from Christians of Lesser Prominence Than Those Above
Tertullian
What a spectacle when the world and its many products, shall be consumed in one great flame! How vast a spectacle then bursts upon the eye! What there excites my admiration? What my derision? Which sight gives me joy?… as I see… illustrious monarchs… groaning in the lowest darkness, Philosophers as fire consumes them! Poets trembling before the judgment-seat of Christ! I shall hear the tragedians, louder-voiced in their own calamity; view play-actors in the dissolving flame; behold wrestlers, not in their gymnasia, but tossing in the fiery billows… What inquisitor or priest in his munificence will bestow on you the favor of seeing and exulting in such things as these? Yet even now we in a measure have them by faith in the picturings of imagination.
[De Spectaculis, Chapter XXX]
St. Anthony Mary Claret
Once [a soul] is condemned by God, then Godʼs friends agree in Godʼs judgment and condemnation. For all eternity they will not have a kind thought for this wretch. Rather they will be satisfied to see him in the flames as a victim of Godʼs justice. (“The just shall rejoice when he shall see the revenge . . .” Psalm 57:11) They will abhor him. A mother will look from paradise upon her own condemned son without being moved, as though she had never known him.
“The Pains of Hell,” Ignatian Spiritual Exercises, consisting of thirty-five meditations from The Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius as explained by St. Anthony Mary Claret. St. Claretʼs ‘explanations’ were written in Spanish in the late 1800ʼs. (www.fatima.org)
Catholic Truth Society
What will it be like for a mother in heaven who sees her son burning in hell? She will glorify the justice of God.
Catholic Truth Society pamphlet from the late 1960s, part of a catechismal teaching [cited in an essay by the English poet, Stevie Smith, “Some Impediments to Christian Commitment”]
Thomas Boston [Scottish preacher]
God shall not pity them but laugh at their calamity. The righteous company in heaven shall rejoice in the execution of Godʼs judgment, and shall sing while the smoke riseth up for ever.
William King
The goodness as well as the happiness of the blessed will be confirmed and advanced by reflections naturally arising from this view of the misery which some shall undergo, which seems to be a good reason for the creation of those beings who shall be finally miserable, and for the continuation of them in their miserable existence.
[De Origine Mali, 1702]
Something on Which Catholics and Calvinists Agreed
For centuries, Christians believed that the heavenly few would see and even rejoice at the sight of hellʼs multitude being eternally tortured. As Paul Johnson pointed out in A History of Christianity, “This displeasing notion was advanced and defended with great tenacity over several centuries, and was one of the points Catholics and orthodox Calvinists had in common.”
This “abominable fancy” (as it came to be named) was based on various Bible verses:
The righteous shall rejoice when he sees the vengeance.
Psalm 58:10
Let the wicked perish at the presence of God. But let the righteous rejoice before God: yea, let them exceedingly rejoice.
Psalm 68:2-3,22-23
In Isaiah 30:31-33 a human sacrifice takes place (the ‘man’ who is killed represents the nation of Assyria), and the act is accompanied by festival songs, gladness of heart, the sound of the flute, tambourines and lyres. Moreover, “the Lord” performs the sacrifice.
And they shall go forth, and look upon the carcasses of the men that have transgressed against me.
Isaiah 66:24
A man suffering in ‘Hades’ sees another man luxuriating in ‘Abrahamʼs bosom,’ and vice versa.
Luke, chapter 16
Ye shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out.
Luke 13:28
They shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: And the smoke of their torment shall ascend up forever and ever. Rejoice over her, thou heaven, and ye holy apostles and prophets; for God hath avenged you on her. And again they said, Alleluia. And her smoke rose up for ever and ever.
Revelation 14:9-11; 18:20, 19:3
Having such ‘inspired’ verses behind it, this teaching did not grow out of favor with orthodox Christian theologians until the age of the Enlightenment when, for instance, Thomas Burnet punctured it with a prick of irony, “What a theater of providence this is: by far the greatest part of the human race burning in flames forever and ever. Oh what a spectacle on the stage, worthy of an audience of God and angels! And then to delight the ear, while this unhappy crowd fills heaven and earth with wailing and howling, you have a truly divine harmony.” [De Statu Mortuorum & Resurgentium Tractatus, 1720]
But even today the idea is defended even with enthusiasm as in Trevor C. Johnsonʼs thesis, Seeing Hell, which is online here, composed for his masterʼs degree in Biblical Studies at Reformed Theological Seminary in 2004. It should be noted that his doctrinal beliefs no matter how dark they may appear to some, do not seem to interfere with his desire to love and help others. Johnson is a loving and faithful Christian missionary, husband, and parent who serves some poor villagers in a potentially dangerous mission field. Trevor and I have shared emails of a pleasant nature since he contacted me first after finding some references to “the abominable fancy” in my book, Leaving the Fold: Testimonies of Former Fundamentalists.
I would like some Evangelical Christian apologists on the web who disagree with the views I have cited from Christian leaders to read Johnsonʼs masterʼs thesis which is now online (and also offered at amazon.com where some Christian readers awarded it four out of five stars) and ponder why the Holy Spirit allowed the most prominent figures in Christendom to come up with such conclusions even after praying to the Holy Spirit who is supposed to lead Christians into all truth. And think of the consequences of such teachings being held so prominently by so many Christians for so long.
Positive Amazon reviews of Seeing Hell:
By M. Pierceon
The author leads the reader through a systematic analysis of views expressed by past and present religious figures regarding his subject, and then applies Holy Writ in a convincing manner. The book persuaded me that hell is visible from heaven, and that the glory of a holy God is thereby magnified. Not for the squeamish, or for those whose god is a jolly rendition of Santa Claus.
By Ronald Miller Sr.
Donʼt leave earth without reading. A side of Godʼs glory you probably havenʼt heard. Excellent for believers & Non-believers, Biblically sound, Answers the tough “God” questions, page turner, describes attributes of God and His rational, How God has glory from those in Hell, Doctrine of Grace, What heaven will be like, Why the sight of the saints in heaven will include hell, comprehensive research, evidenced in over 200 footnotes, Joy in seeing those in hell!
By Peggion
This fellow presents a compelling case that those in heaven will be able to see those in hell and vise versa. My granddaughter recently told me her fellowship group was discussing this concept and I decided to research it. Trevor Johnsonʼs work was one of the first I came across, and I found it to be a compelling, well researched, and carefully presented case. He presents both Biblical and historical evidence for his theses. I highly recommend this book.
By Richard O. Tailleferon
The author turns to the Scriptures revealing what the Bible has to say concerning heaven and hell, and whether the saints will behold hell, and the wicked will behold heaven. The author demonstrates the Bible clearly reveals that the saints shall view the wicked in hell and glorify God for their salvation, while those in hell will see the saints in heaven adding to their torment.
Extra Credit
READ Heaven and Hell in Christian Thought at The Stanford Online Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Christianity & Divorce (no convincing evidence for supernatural grace, plenty of evidence that a host of known cultural factors take precedence)
Chuck Norris also had a child out of wedlock.
The statistics are undeniable that Christians are just as prone to divorce as non-Christians in the U.S., and that cultural and sociological factors play a more convincing role than Godʼs invisible guidance when it comes to the failures of marriages in the U.S.
Divorce Among Christian Leaders
Charles Stanley, former president of the Southern Baptist Convention, pastor, religious TV personality, was divorced by his wife. The settlement she received depended on her remaining silent concerning her reasons for wanting the divorce.
Ned Graham, son of Billy Graham, was divorced by his wife on the basis of “infidelity, domestic violence, and drug and alcohol abuse.” Ned is head of East Gate Ministries, which distributes Bibles in China, and he continues to be supported in that capacity by his famous father.
Hal Lindsey, who has sold millions of books on “the soon coming end times and return of Jesus” has been divorced multiple times.
Bob Larson, well known Christian pastor and exorcist, is divorced. He trains people to cast out Satan and is an American radio and television evangelist, and pastor of Spiritual Freedom Church in Phoenix, Arizona.
Divorce Among Contemporary Christian Musicians
Divorce among Contemporary Christian “artists” is rampant. Just a few of the divorced or separated CCM musicians are Sandi Patty, Deniece Williams, Sheila Walsh, John Talbot, Randy Stonehill, Larry Norman, Tom Howard, Ralph Carmichael, Steve Archer, Amy Grant and Gary Chapman (both Amy and Gary have gotten remarried since their 1997 divorce), Stacy Jones of the rap group Grits, and all of the members of the now disbanded Barnabas. Melody Green, widowed wife of Keith Green (who was killed in a plane crash in 1982), recently divorced her second husband, Andrew Sievright.
Divorce Among Charismatics & Pentecostals
Divorce is also rampant among Pentecostal-Charismatic leaders. Aimee Semple McPherson, founder of the Four Square Pentecostal Churches, was a divorced adulteress, as was famous Pentecostal evangelist Kathryn Kuhlmann.
Richard Roberts, who is in the process of taking over the ministry of his father, Oral, divorced his first wife and married an Oral Roberts University student.
Jim and Tammy Bakker (of the PTL Club) divorced.
Jimmy Swaggart paid a prostitute on multiple occasions to give him a private strip show and even asked her if she would take money to have her daughter strip for him. The woman declined the second offer.
In July 2007 two well-known Charismatic pastors got divorces (Ray McCauley of Johannesburg, South Africa, and Clarence McClendon of Los Angeles).
John Jacobs, founder of the Power Team, was divorced from his wife of 16 years this summer.
Reverends Randy and Paula White divorced. Members of their church, Without Walls International Church, reacted with tears and a chorus of “Oh, no” after the founders and co-pastors of what has been one of the nationʼs biggest and fastest-growing churches announced the divorce at Thursday nightʼs service. SOURCE Later we read… Megachurch Pastor Paula White Weds Rocker Jonathan Cain in Third Marriage.
Gospel singer Juanita Bynum filed for divorce after her pastor husband beat her outside a hotel… Police say that during an argument Weeks choked Bynum, pushed her to the ground and started to kick and stomp on her. A hotel employee intervened and pulled Weeks off her, police said… Weeks, faced charges of aggravated assault and terroristic threats following the confrontation, which police say left his estranged wife badly bruised. Juanitaʼs ministry blossomed after she preached at a singles event about breaking free of sexual promiscuity. Among her books are No More Sheets: The Truth About Sex, and Matters of the Heart. Her album A Piece of My Passion, had been listed in the top 10 gospel albums by Billboard magazine for several months. She also preaches through televised sermons. The couple married in 2002 in a televised wedding. Together, they wrote “Teach Me How to Love You: The Beginnings.” Today they are divorced. And in July of 2012 Juanita Bynum confessed during a radio show interview that she had had lesbian encounters in the past. “Iʼve been there and Iʼve done it all. I did the drugs, Iʼve been with men, Iʼve been with women. All of it,” she said July 13 on the Atlanta-based radio show. SOURCE
Benny Hinn divorced his wife due to her drug problem involving prescription pills, later remarrying her.
Divorce Among Fundamental Baptists
Pastor Peter Ruckman of Pensacola, Florida, is twice divorced and thrice married. He has written a booklet to justify his position.
Pastor Jack Hyles has counseled divorced men to go into the pastorate and has encouraged others to stay in the pastorate after their divorces. Hyles calls adultery a “mistake”; and in his sermon “The Good Man Versus the Spiritual Man” (Dec. 20, 1987) Hyles said that the only difference between those who commit adultery and those who do not is that in the latter the sin of adultery is “in remission.”
SEE ALSO This article about divorce being rampant among Christian leaders
And the site Pimp Preacher with its top 20 scandals
Divorce: 1999 Survey Results
Baptists are more likely than members of any other Christian denomination to be divorced… according to a national survey by the Barna Research Group… Nationally, 29 percent of all Baptist adults have been divorced, the Barna survey said. The only Christian group with a higher divorce rate are those who attend non-denominational Protestant churches, with a 34 percent divorce rate.
Mormons, who emphasize strong families, are near the national average at 24 percent, Barna reported.
Among those who describe themselves as born-again Christians, 27 percent are currently or have previously been divorced, compared to 24 percent among adults who do not describe themselves as born-again.
“While it may be alarming to discover that born-again Christians are more likely than others to experience a divorce, that pattern has been in place for quite some time,” said George Barna, president of Barna Research Group. Alabama, which has more than one million Southern Baptists and a majority of evangelical Protestants in a population of 4.3 million, ranks fourth nationally in divorce rates, according to U.S. government statistics. It ranks behind Nevada, Tennessee and Arkansas among top divorce rates.
The Rev. Stacy Pickering, minister of young married adults and director of counseling at Shades Mountain Baptist Church, said the statistics are skewed because Baptist churches encourage young people to get married—sometimes when theyʼre not properly prepared—rather than have pre-marital sex or co-habitate.
Greg Garrison, News staff writer, The Birmingham News, 12/30/1999
Born Again Christians Just as Likely to Divorce as are Non-Christians - September 8, 2004
Although many Christian churches attempt to dissuade congregants from getting a divorce, the research confirmed an earlier finding by Barna a decade ago (further confirmed through tracking studies conducted each year since): born again Christians have the same likelihood of divorce as do non-Christians. Among married born again Christians, 35% have experienced a divorce. That figure is identical to the outcome among married adults who are not born again: 35%.
“Born again Christians” were defined in the survey as people who said they have made “a personal commitment to Jesus Christ that is still important in their life today” and who also indicated they believe that when they die they will go to Heaven because they had confessed their sins and had accepted Jesus Christ as their savior… Being classified as “born again” was not dependent upon church or denominational affiliation or involvement. [Those who were not “born again” probably included nominal Christians, Christians unsure of their beliefs, guilt-ridden, backslidden Christians, believers in heterodox forms of Christianity who might not describe their beliefs as Barna did, as well as Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, New Agers, Wiccans, agnostics and atheists. In other words, the “hell-bound.” Yet their divorce rates equaled those of the “Born Agains.”—E.T.B.]
The survey showed that the percentages of those who were divorced varied somewhat according to denominational religious affiliations (or lack thereof): Catholics (25%), atheists and agnostics (37%), Protestants (39%). Further subdividing the Protestants into their respective major denominations revealed that Presbyterians had the fewest divorces (28%), and Pentecostals had the most (44%).
George Barna noted that one reason why the divorce statistic among non-Born again adults is not higher is that a larger proportion of that group cohabits, effectively side-stepping marriage—and divorce—altogether. “If the non-born again population were to marry at the same rate as the born again group, it is likely that their divorce statistic would be roughly 38%—marginally higher (>3%) than that among the born again group, but still surprisingly similar in magnitude.”
Barna also noted, “The data suggest that relatively few divorced Christians experienced their divorce before accepting Christ as their savior.” [Does that mean most Christians experienced their divorce after accepting Christ as their savior?—E.T.B.] Research also indicated that a surprising number of Christians experienced divorces both before and after their conversion. Multiple divorces are also unexpectedly common among born again Christians. Barnaʼs figures show that nearly one-quarter of the married born agains (23%) get divorced two or more times. (www.barna.org)
According to the Dallas Morning News, a Dallas TX newspaper, the national study “raised eyebrows, sowed confusion, [and] even brought on a little holy anger.” This caused George Barna to write a letter to his supporters, saying that he is standing by his data, even though it is upsetting. He said that “We rarely find substantial differences between the moral behavior of Christians and non-Christians.”
Donald Hughes, author of The Divorce Reality, admitted that “[Christians] are subject to the same problems as everyone else, and they include a lack of relationship skills.” SOURCE
More 2004 Survey Results:“Bible Belt” Has Nationʼs Highest Divorce Rate
The state with the lowest divorce rate in the nation is Massachusetts. At latest count it had a divorce rate of 2.4 per 1,000 population, while the rate for Texas was 4.1. But donʼt take the U.S. governmentʼs word for it. Take a look at the findings from the George Barna Research Group. George Barna, a born-again Christian whose company is in Ventura, Calif., found that Massachusetts does indeed have the lowest divorce rate among all 50 states.
More disturbing was the finding that born-again Christians have among the highest divorce rates.
The Associated Press, using data supplied by the US Census Bureau, found that the highest divorce rates are to be found in the Bible Belt. The AP report stated, “The divorce rates in these conservative states are roughly 50 percent above the national average of 4.2 per thousand people.” The 10 Southern states with some of the highest divorce rates were Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Texas. By comparison nine states in the Northeast were among those with the lowest divorce rates: Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Vermont.
How to explain these differences? The following factors provide a partial answer:
More couples in the South enter their first marriage at a younger age.
Average household incomes are lower in the South.
Southern states have a lower percentage of Roman Catholics, “a denomination that does not recognize divorce.” Barnaʼs study showed that 21 percent of Catholics had been divorced, compared with 29 percent of Baptists.
Education. Massachusetts has about the highest rate of education in the country, with 85 percent completing high school. For Texas the rate is 76 percent. One third of Massachusettsʼ residents have completed college, compared with 23 percent of Texans, and the other Northeast states are right behind Massachusetts. The liberals from Massachusetts have long prided themselves on their emphasis on education, and it has paid off: People who stay in school longer get married at a later age, when they are more mature, are more likely to secure a better job, and job income increases with each level of formal education. As a result, Massachusetts also leads in per capita and family income while births by teenagers, as a percent of total births, was 7.4 for Massachusetts and 16.1 for Texas. The Northeast corridor, with Massachusetts as the hub, does have one of the highest levels of Catholics per state total. And it is also the case that these are among the states most strongly supportive of the Catholic Churchʼs teaching on social justice issues such as minimum and living wages and universal healthcare.
William V. DʼAntonio [Professor emeritus at University of Connecticut and a visiting research professor at Catholic University in Washington, D.C.], “Walking the Walk on Family Values,” The Boston Globe, October 31, 2004
One Born Again Christian Tells Another Born Again Christian that there is Something Wrong About Conservative Christianityʼs Affect on Women & Their Autonomy
Craig Sowder, a Christian blogger and all around nice guy, has written:
Currently work in a secular work environment where I am around plenty of non-Christians. I also went to a public high school and I attended a secular college for a year. So Iʼve been around my fair share of both Christians and non-Christians, and let me tell you that Christian women need to take a few lessons from non-Christian women. The non-Christian women Iʼve been around over the years are not afraid to get into relationships with men and actually arrive at conclusions about men far more quickly than Christian women. Sometimes I donʼt think Christian women will go out for a cup of coffee with a guy without some kind of sign in the heavens telling them to go for it.
Craig says here in no uncertain terms that non-Christian women are much more of what a woman should be: thinking for themselves, and taking responsibility for themselves… he is praising secular women for their autonomy, while lamenting the lack of autonomy in Christian women. Craig has also expressed multiple times in the past that he thinks that Christian women are crazy…
Christianity & Divorce Compared with the Anti-Gay Marriage Stance of Christians
One of the interesting features of the current efforts by the Christian Right to attack gay marriage is that their rhetoric about saving families doesnʼt match their actions. Why not, for example, invest similar attention to something like divorce or spousal abuse? These affect far more people and marriages than gay marriage ever could.
Austin Cline, “Pharisees Gathering Stones”
Half of heterosexual marriages in our society end in divorce. We heterosexuals are doing a lousy job of “defending” marriage. Adultery is a big part of the reason. So if weʼre going to rewrite our Constitution to “protect” marriage from sin because it is the “God-ordained bedrock of society,” then I would think that adultery would be a much better target [than homosexuality].
Howard Troxler, columnist, St. Petersburg Times, November 14, 2004
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