Disturbing Passages in Holy Books

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Yes, those ancient explanations of ill health have always been dangerous. If it's not evil spirits, it's a punishment on the afflicted one (or their parents!) for some transgression or other, or maybe God just gave it you so that Jesus could heal it and prove Christianity to be correct. Or maybe it was Adam and Eve's fault. Medical science drives a coach and horses through all that baloney every time it cures somebody, and so it's likely to be seen as a threat to fundamentalism. Science has always troubled fundamentalists with its confounded evolution and old-Earth cosmology, its emphasis on critical thinking, and its rejection of faith as having anything to do with getting the right answers.

I already talked about this account in 1 Kings 18 where there’s a showdown between Baal’s prophets and Yahweh’s prophet - Elijah, but this is an entertaining video with an on-point tie in to apologetics.

Yes it's odd how they say some people were given proof (always impossible to reproduce or demonstrate to me) while they say the general idea is that it's wrong to want it and that faith is the important thing. My favourite is Doubting Thomas, who wasn't killed for expecting and receiving hard evidence. Maybe God spared him because he'd been one of Jesus' core group rather than a priest for a rival deity.

There's a similar kind of thing in the Bhagavad Gita - Arjuna refuses to fight in a holy war, on the grounds that war always does a lot of harm and he doesn't like killing people, so Lord Krishna shows himself to Arjuna in loads of impressive supernatural forms, and at the end of it, Arjuna agrees to get on with the bloodshed. It's easy to write a story about somebody being given proof, and if it's not possible to test the story for veracity, that seems to be enough for some folks. I guess some folks just don't do scientific rigour.

^ They seem to engage in a lot of circular reasoning. How do we know the Bible is from God? Because it says so.

Another Demon Possession Story. This particular account happens in Acts 16 with Paul and Silas.

In verses 16-18:

I’ve often heard people argue that since we’re living in the “Goldilocks zone,” which is just right for humans and other life forms that we know of, it proves that there was a creator. It’s absurd because, given how massive the universe is, it’s quite likely that some planets would be in the Goldilocks zone. (Also, we seem well-suited for Earth because we evolved here, not because the Earth was tailor-made for us.) In my experience, they often combine this with other silly arguments such as (my personal favorite): “We know that God created the universe because of how perfectly aligned everything is, running like gears in a watch (blah blah blah).” Stuff crashes into other stuff all the time on a small and grand scale. It appears random as one would expect from the Big Bang. I suppose people could claim that God started the Big Bang, but most often, it’s been more about strictly upholding the account in Genesis. When they do acknowledge the messy randomness of the universe, like stars colliding, I’ve even heard some argue that it’s due to the fallout in the Garden of Eden. Maybe all this is related to the appeal of thinking that we’re more important than we are from a cosmic perspective.

From Carl Sagan’s Pale Blue Dot:

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Yes the "Goldilocks Zone" argument does seem rather cart-before-horse, to say the least. The universe contains billions of locations encompassing a staggeringly wide range of environmental conditions. It's no miracle that one of those locations is (for a while) able to support the self-reproduction of RNA, DNA, and their various assistive phenotypes (viruses, fungi, plants, and animals). I suppose if viruses could think and talk, some of them might say that it stands to reason that a deity had provided the world just for them. Or maybe a few grateful religious rocks would hold a similar view, as they clearly beat humans hands down in the abundance race.

The whole teleological argument for a deity is nothing like a proof, and it's been quite well-discredited over the centuries so that it can't rationally be considered to be evidence of any appreciable strength. But apologists still use it, and (somebody correct me if I'm wrong), they hardly ever bother to mention the arguments against it. I guess they're hoping their readers aren't educated enough to have seen those arguments, and / or they're deliberately leaving the work of explaining the logical objections to the other side, which is a common strategy employed by adversarial debaters who are interested not in the truth but in winning the argument whether they're right or wrong.

I hadn't seen the tale of Elisha and his she-bears before. That was hilarious, and is yet another example of a moral code that I couldn't in all conscience sign up to or support in any way. Those ancient Jewish leaders seem to have had no notion of fitting the punishment to the crime, did they? I suppose they thought it was OK because the kids had targeted an individual who was at the top of the theocratic food chain. Bullying a slave is one thing, bullying one of the Great And Good is another matter entirely.

I for one am relieved to be living in an age where class distinction itself is considered wrong by huge swathes of people. It's particularly strange that in the USA, where even the religious rednecks are proud of their country's dislike of elitism, so many still take their moral guidance from mind-bogglingly elitist scripture. But maybe an apologist somewhere says that God would have unleashed the she-bears for any victim of a "baldy" taunt, however lowly. If so, I can't prove him wrong.

It's not necessary to look far to find religionists saying the silliest, most vacuous things. Don Johnstone provides this "information" on the important matter of God's nose, for the enlightenment of the human race:
https://reasonsforhopejesus.com/the-nose-of-god/
He's got to be joking of course, but I don't think he is. It's one of a series of 13 about the deity's various body parts. I'm relieved that he stopped at 13, as I shudder to think what else he could have come up with.

^ Speaking of absurdity:



Book of Mormon, Alma 39:5 states: “Know ye not, my son, that these things [sexual “sins”] are an abomination in the sight of the Lord; yea, most abominable above all sins save it be the shedding of innocent blood or denying the Holy Ghost?”

I can relate to that. During my trial with the elders in my church, they said that my sexual “sin” was as bad as murder because fornication is listed in some of the same scriptures as murder - things God hates.

Revelation 21:8 says, “But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the polluted, the murderers, the sexually immoral, the sorcerers, the idolaters, and all liars, their place will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”

My church also claimed that not preaching made people “blood guilty” based on scriptures such as Ezekiel 33:8-9:

“If I say to the wicked, ‘O wicked ones, you shall surely die,’ and you do not speak to warn the wicked to turn from their ways, the wicked shall die in their iniquity, but their blood I will require at your hand. 9 But if you warn the wicked to turn from their ways and they do not turn from their ways, the wicked shall die in their iniquity, but you will have saved your life.”

Based on personal observation, reading nothing but holy books and cult publications for decades seems to be an effective way to become stupid. Before I left, I remember looking at the elders when they said something particularly idiotic and thinking: “And I’m supposed to follow these bozos?! JFC.”

I found that as a believer I had to try to shut the reasoning/critical parts of my brain off. While that’s an admittedly gross oversimplification, I’m not sure how else to describe it. It’s really strange to look back on. Perhaps compartmentalizing would be accurate. I was never that good at it. There was constant critical chatter going on in the back of my head when I listened to a sermon or read the Bible/religious publications. It was like I was constantly at war with myself. Life is hard enough without that nonsense.

I suppose you went against this somewhat disturbing advice:

Psalms 3:5 Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.

Some interpret it as meaning merely "don't think your own understanding is everything," which isn't so bad as what it might mean - i.e. don't think, don't trust your own judgement. Problem with that is, our own judgement and our own understanding is ultimately all we have. Even if we defer to a deity, scripture or spiritual authority, we're the one who has judged it appropriate to do so. And what are we trusting in otherwise? A deity who never communicates to us through our five senses and behaves exactly as though he doesn't exist, an old book that claims to be written by the deity but is so vaguely written that it's often wide open to interpretation, or priests who have this odd belief that they're the authentic mouthpiece of the deity.

The shutting off of the critical faculty is a thing that many people do. There are some beliefs that seem to make them feel secure, and somehow sensible argument to the contrary has no effect on them. I suspect that those with ASD aren't in general quite so susceptible to that error of judgement.

My former religion LOVED that scripture. I wanted to follow it, but I never could do so no matter how much I tried and no matter how much I prayed. I don’t do anything half-assed. I felt like there was something wrong with me. Once I let myself research the Bible, my religion, science, and philosophy, the guilt rooted in my skepticism quickly faded away. It took some time to get to that point because I had always been taught to stay away from and to even be fearful of anything that might conflict with the belief system because that’s how Satan supposedly gets ya.

Better Satan than Yahweh.

I was raised in a strict baptist house (my mum's family were/are involved with something called the Brethren) and by far the worst line for me was "if someone hits one side of your face, turn and let him hit the other also. And if someone takes your coat, let them take your shirt as well" (somewhere in the book of Luke).

It's absolutely terrible advice, as it trains you to be the perfect target in life and to feel great about it. I remember questioning that when I was younger and was told a bunch of crap like 'people will see how peaceful you are and will move on', or 'they will see how strong you are and won't bother you', etc. Which is rubbish, because the type of people that are happy to go around attacking you are not the type of people that give any thought to whether the person actually deserves to be attacked. They are just looking for either a punchbag to take out their anger on or an easy target to use and throw away. It led to years of abuse of all kinds from a lot of different people. And the same people that taught me the above, never gave a damn when it happened. If anything they encouraged it and used it to manipulate and control me even more. So when I hear that verse, I feel physically sick. It's completely repulsive to me, because I know where it leads.

I now teach the younger kids in my family to fight back, but fight fair. You don't go around attacking people, but if someone attacks you then you have every right to defend yourself and don't feel guilty for it. Then once the war is over, you walk away and don't keep kicking them while they are down. Hopefully as a result they will have a better experience as they grow up.

There's a lot of verses in the Bible that are terrible advice, but that's probably the most dangerous for me.

^ I can certainly relate to that! That piece of advice was probably one of the reasons why I was such a doormat. It’s like all of the pieces of the puzzle came together to turn me into the perfect victim.

Kind of related was my church’s pushing of putting on “the new personality.”

Ephesians 4:24 says “to clothe yourselves with the new self, created according to the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.” (The biased translation of the Bible we used says “personality” instead of “self.”)

Colossians 3:10 says something similar and then in verse 14 it states: “Therefore, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience.” Meekness was extremely ingrained in me, especially given the scriptures about female subjection in the Bible, although it wasn’t a natural part of my personality. As a young child, I was stubborn, headstrong, independent, a feminist, and practically-perfect-in-every-way ( ), but that was eventually beaten and coerced out of me by religious nonsense. Well, I was and am me on the inside, but it’s hard to be me on the outside. I’m very timid in person.

They also liked the scriptures about the fruitage of the Holy Spirit in Galatians 5:22-23a which says: “By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, and self-control.” Once again, their translation of the Bible is slightly different. Instead of “gentleness,” it says “mildness,” and they really focus on that characteristic. They also zero in on all those scriptures that glorify being sheep.

It’s just a lot of toxic BS in which people are taught that they aren’t good enough as they are and that they should be meek to the point of not even sticking up for themselves when they are being mistreated in some way. Victims are often further pushed into blaming themselves and into adjusting their own behavior instead of being empowered to fight against tyranny and injustice.

It reminds me of a quote from The Color Purple in which Celie says: “I don’t know how to fight. All I know how to do is stay alive.”

"As a young child, I was stubborn, headstrong, independent, and practically-perfect-in-every-way ( ), but that was eventually beaten and coerced out of me by religious nonsense"

Yep! You said it perfectly! I look back at old videos of myself when I was a kid and I was a bit of a hyperactive odd-ball, but I was the sort of child that I would have loved to have had myself! But I was brainwashed into being this subservient, overworked, quiet little robot that only cared about whether everyone else was happy. Every time I started to act more like myself, there was some sort of punishment.

I now have a little niece who has stayed over a couple of days a week since she was born, and while she's not my daughter I am very protective over her and I LOVE that she has a big personality, questions me and doesn't just blindly follow what I say. Yeah, it means I have to have eyes at the back of my head and make sure I have a good explanation ready for everything! But I don't want her to 'shut up and do as you're told' or worry 'if you act that way, then you'll go to hell'. I want her to enjoy life on her own terms, whatever she decides to do. And if her views on everything are the polar opposite to mine, then I'll respect her as an individual rather than trying to beat her down to agree with me.

I think since my niece and nephews were born, I've been able to view things more from the perspective of my parents/family/teachers/religious leaders. And the excuses I gave for them when I was younger no longer hold any weight. I used to think maybe I just didn't get it because I'm not a parent. But I can't imagine saying/doing a lot of the things that were done to me to my niece. It wasn't some twisted sort of 'tough love'. It was just abuse. There's no justification for it. The same goes for my old excuses about why 'god' does x, y, z to humans, yet supposedly loves us. It no longer works. God would have to be a psychopath to just stand there and let certain things happen. I wouldn't act like that with my niece and I don't have magical omnipresent abilities to use! Do better!

That's just the Bible (or Abrahamic) version of 'god' though. I don't have such an issue with how other religions view things. I could go along with a 'god' who created the universe like a super advanced VR game and then walked off down the pub with his mates and forgot it was still running. The absent deity argument I can understand better.

My parents had a really difficult time with the way I decided to raise my son. They even called me a “permissive parent” due to my stance on corporal punishment. He’s 13 now and a great kid. He’s smart, curious, confident, sensitive, incredibly funny, works hard in school, has goals, and hasn’t engaged in any concerning behavior (yet) despite being ND himself. I feel like my choices were the right ones. He often tells me that I’m “the best mother in the world.” We are a lot alike, so that probably makes things somewhat easier. I’ve never been much of a disciplinarian and favored positive reinforcement and encouragement instead. When he was younger, I decided to pick my battles, so I’d often redirect or even ignore stuff. Often, behavior can be annoying but not bad. My parents felt like everything needed to be corrected and punished.

In addition to the pro-corporal punishment scriptures, my church was obsessed with obedience, especially blind obedience, and all the scriptures pertaining to it. Ephesians 6:1 says: “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.” While it’s often a good idea for kids to obey their parents, sometimes they are wrong. Even I am wrong on very rare occasions. In any case, I wanted my kid to make the right choices because they are right, not because I told him to, so we’ve always talked a lot about why it’s a good idea to do or not do…just about anything. He disagrees with me sometimes which is okay. We tend to agree on most things though. Apparently, the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.

The Ten Commandments say to honor your father and mother. Sometimes parents aren’t worthy of honor. My son’s father certainly isn’t. I try to be worthy of my son’s respect, and it seems like I’ve succeeded. The respect is mutual. I don’t like the concept of a hierarchy that puts older people above younger people. It’s really toxic and can make stuff such as grooming more likely. For the most part, everyone, including ourselves, is worthy of an equal amount of honor, respect, and dignity. As a mom, I’ve always strived to keep that in mind.

Weird Angels in the Bible

Ophanim (Ezekiel 1:15-21)



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NGiiPTD8swk

Cherubim (Ezekiel 1:4-14) They have four faces. In verses 13-14: “The appearance of the living creatures was like burning coals of fire or like torches. Fire moved back and forth among the creatures; it was bright, and lightening flashed out of it. 14 The creatures sped back and forth like flashes of lightning.” In the video, it’s in a chill mood. Maybe it had recently smoked some weed.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrIKGpHbRlc

Seraphim (Isaiah 6:2-8)



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2qdmPzc4v3c

Four Living Creatures (Revelation 4:6-8) In verse 8: Day and night they never stop saying:

“‘Holy, holy, holy

is the Lord God Almighty,’

who was, and is, and is to come.” That’d get old awfully quick. I wonder if God ever tells them to just shut up.



Hmmm… Maybe as an adult it’s more silly than disturbing. I think the Ophanim looks cool though. With some of this stuff, the influence of older religions/cults is extremely apparent. My church took a lot of these passages figuratively, but I don’t remember what their interpretation was. I was quite young when they talked about it, and I did what I normally did in church: zone out and daydream. I was a very sensible child.

"I don’t like the concept of a hierarchy that puts older people above younger people. It’s really toxic and can make stuff such as grooming more likely. For the most part, everyone, including ourselves, is worthy of an equal amount of honor, respect, and dignity."

True that! It sounds as though you're doing a great job.

Also, those angels look pretty amazing! haha! I was always under the impression they were astrological symbols. For example, the bull being taurus, the lion being leo, etc. Although your versions are much cooler! I wouldn't mind seeing some of those in real life!