How can I respond to the following Christian "apologetic"......

I find that I really like thinknig of Daniel Dennett’s “intuition pumps” to help arguments. One famous example is the scenario where you see a trolley barreling toward a crowd of people and your only way to stop it is to push a guy in front of it to stop it. Intuition pumping refers to tweaking the details of a moral teaching tool like this one and seeing what happens. If it remains coherent, it’s a good moral tool; if it falls apart, it is not. For example:
What if the trolley were only going to kill one person?
What if the trolley were to kill a thousand people instead of a small crowd?
What if the pushed guy had a chance of surviving?
What if you knew there was a camera overhead which would record your decision to push?
What if, instead of a trolley, this was a terrorist and you had to torture the “pushed” guy to stop him?
See how that works? Change the details and see how well the moral dilemma holds. This one retains meaning fairly well.
You can do this with the Bible, too. Look at the example of Abraham sacrificing his son Isaac:
What if Abraham was schizophrenic?
What if Isaac was adopted?
What if Isaac was a monster?
What if Isaac was really an entire clan?
What if God, in this example, was really Satan posing as Him?
What if Abraham was a mob?
This one doesn’t hold together as well as the trolley decision scenario. Changing some of these details drastically changes the meaning of the story. Particularly, the one of Satan posing as God in this scenario - that says some stuff about submission to authority which the original story completely contradicts.

Hello Michelle D.
I have many of the same type of friends.
Like John said, “Let it be".
When that does not work then it is all about communication.
There is no discussion when comes to items of faith. I could tell you that in my faith I see two suns in the sky and there is no way you could make me think otherwise. Proof that a discussion based on faith is just a waist of time.
So if your friend can use reason and not faith then you have an item of discussion.
The churches have spent millions and millions of hours over a thousand years on answering questions of religion. Therefore your friend has answers available to him on almost any question you my have.
You now have the internet to back you up with facts so that will help in the discussion.
One of the most important items at your disposal is religion itself.
If your friend is like my friends they will only use the NT and OT. When the discussion is not going the way they would like they will discard the OT completely saying the NT is God’s new words.
You have all the history of mankind’s religion at your disposal and are not limited to just the bible.
The bible is the foundation of their belief. What I have found is the bible is based upon older religions. There is not one original religious idea or religious thought is in the bible.
Your friend will try and prove otherwise and you are able to take the discussion outside of the bible and open a whole new world of religion to your friend.

Lily:

Gary views the Bible text as a collection of stories for different purposes at different times. This is a view, and it basically dismisses the Bible as irrelevant. On the other hand, the NT reveals the meaning of the Scripture as for all time given by God for the restoration of mankind. It paints an entire picture, and like the blind men touching parts of the elephant, you must be able to see the whole to understand what’s before you.
I in no way dismiss the Bible as irrelevant. It is the most important single collection of books in Western Culture and I have spent the last fifteen years studying it. However, I have studied it in context, not as the "Word of God" but as a collection of stories that have been edited and reedited multiple times and put to use by various groups of people for a wide variety of purposes. The Old Testament was created to empower and bind together a small mountain tribe in a border wasteland on the eastern edge of the Mediterranean; the New Testament, among other things was created to harmonize the newer Greek/Roman culture that became dominant in this area from the time of Alexander. It is this "harmonization" that became prominent in the new culture of Xtianity. It is IMO, an historical accident that we today are even aware of the teachings and folk lore of the ancient tribe of Judah, in that if the first alphabet hadn't been invented in the Sinai and there fore these folk tale (oral history) hadn't been originally written down in this amazing technological advance rather than the hieroglyphics of the Assyrians, Mesopotamians, and Babylonians many people might be today still worshiping their gods such as Baal, mentioned in the Bible and who was the god of Hannibal. Without the Bible and the uses it has been put to the history of Western Civilization would have been very different. This does not mean that there is any god but only that humans, in the past have found religion a very useful tool to organize society with and the Bible, and disputes over what it is and means, has been one of the main components of Western religion.
I have a lot of discussions about religion with a friend of mine. He's very open to reason (... bad way to put it), but there's one thing I have not yet been able to get through to: Old Testament atrocities.
Hi michelle: It's unlikely you worry your friend is in any danger of repeating those atrocities. Is he bringing up Old Testament stories, or are you? Are such stories the foundation of his Christianity? You don't really want to merely score points off a friend. if you're really concerned about his being a Christian, you might want to think about what the real fulcrum of his faith is. My suggestion is that it's almost certainly not dependent on the morality of ancient warfare and treatment of enemies. Chris Kirk Hi Chris, and thanks for the input. No, of course I'm not worried about my friend going that overboard, at least not in his case (as with others I'm sometimes not all that sure about it). And you're correct, I brought up the atrocities, but not to argue him out of his faith. Our discussions are very philosophical. We're both interested in truth, and of course both of us think we're on the better track. :-) Michelle
Since this thread just rose to the top again, I'll add that I just saw an interesting YouTube. Matt Dillahunty, famous grumpy atheist from Austin is attending an "Explore God" workshop, several sessions. His first report on it starts with a great speech about accepting that every denomination is different, and if you get down the pew (or stadium seat) level there are differences there. An religious conversation that doesn't recognize this will go nowhere. As LilySmith pointed out, you need to know their motivating factors. It sounds like there is some overriding sense for your friend that God is taking us somewhere and that the ends somehow justify the means. I wouldn't put it that crudely to your friend, but I would explore that ends, at least you will probably find something agreeable (maybe just a fantasy, but at least a nice fantasy). With a goal like that in mind, I could justify just about anything. It's not unlike justifying the bombing of Germany to get Hitler. The hard work then is to alter your friends thinking so something like the Amalekite genocide compares more to bombing Hanoi than to Berlin. These analogies might not fit for you, so hope I make sense.
Hi Lausten. Thanks for the input. By now this conversation has actually shifted again to the evolution / creation debate (which is utterly ridiculous in my mind), but we're still discussing :-) I'm noticing three different kinds of believers by now, at least on the Christian level. Those who genuinely believe but accept science. Their religion is not simply nominal or cultural but a living faith, only it is not based on a literal reading of the Bible; the community of faith with its teachings and rituals seems to take preference. Religion is a "backbone" to the pragmatic rest of one's life. Then there are the radical fundamentalists. You can't argue with them as it goes nowhere. The Bible really applies here, as Proverbs says that you shouldn't argue with fools. The third category is really the one hard to get to. They're genuine believers, way too smart to follow blind fundamentalism, but they do buy into the "inerrancy of the Bible" thing. Rather than the community it's that book that provides the backbone. This is a mainly Protestant and also rather new, church historically speaking, phenomenon. It pretty much appeared in response to Darwin, if I'm not mistaken. Really the best answer in confronting these kinds of beliefs, in my view, are Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Karl Barth, as they put things into perspective and have weight just by who they are. Problem is, it's the U.S. Bonhoeffer and Barth, although revered as martyr and highly respected scholar, respectively, are seen as "liberals" in these circles. Not so in Europe, but that doesn't help much. The thing with our little discussions, my friend and mine that is, is that this are fundamental questions. They involve so much more than just a change of mind. Anyway, we're having fun talking. Michelle
One little thing you can do, without causing any conflict I think, is begin refering to your friends god in the feminine. For example, "When you pray to God, do you think She listens?" So much of religion is purely psychological and emotional, and part of that, in Western male-oriented culture, is that "god" is the protective father/warrior/santa claus/male. When you start to chip away at those silly cultural notions they start (hopefully) to think a little out of the box as far as their beliefs are concerned. Another good one, especially for god-fearing christian Americans is: Are we all Gods children? YES. Does She love all of us equally like any good parent would, or does She favor certain people, like does she only listen to the prayers of Americans? Stuff like that. Even believers who are way more educated about their beliefs than most, and can argue logically about them, still I imagine they have a basic psychological/emotional need to believe that trumps any logical reasoning.
That's funny :-) Yeah, I should try that :-) The gender thing really is a deep point actually. I think it was Nietzsche that said that if you wanna change anything fundamentally you have to begin with grammar. - We can speak of God, but we speak of "the" Goddess. Very interesting thing to ponder I think. Thanks!
Since we're in a week-long conversation by now I'm about to give up. The "eternal" viewpoint is immune to challenge.
The Judeo-Christian view of the world has a 4,000 year history of scholars who have read, interpreted, commented on and studied the Scripture. It is not simply a "bunch of superstition" that can easily be refuted. Hi Lily, very true. I'm actually very interested in Christian theology, as it is quite a lot of thought going on there. But you're right, it's very thought through.
There really isn't anything that will convince True Believers® their god is a monster. The logical conclusion is that an omnipotent,l omniscient god would have know before creating the universe that most of the people He* created would burn in Hell, making that god the worst mass murderer of all time. See LilySmith's apologetic arguments on these forums for the type of thinking it takes to absolve such a monster. Isaac Asimov nailed when he said the Old Testament god had the manners and morals of a spoiled child. *No female god would commit such an atrocity.
Hi Darron, and thanks for the answer. I understand, and I get it, but that is me. How do I make this understandable to a, yes, brainwashed, but still thinking, and thus "redeemable" person? I'm running against walls. The dude is my friend, a very good friend, but in this sense he's utterly deluded... (as I was myself, but as said, to me it was always philosophical). I'm not sure how you can get through. I used to be one of the true believers, but I was seeking truth in the Bible, and when I did not find it one of my friends convinced me to read Darwin's works and the scales fell from my eyes. Maybe instead of attacking the Bible you should go on the offensive and challenge your friend to read some science. Hi Darron, ... interesting point. Also that you mention that you once were a believer. I was one myself. I'm a very religious person by nature. Well, you could also say artistic, as I "feel" more than I think, but this balance is actually very awkward because I left the church not because of feeling but plainly because of thought. Anyway. I've actually tried the science thing via "American Scientific" magazine and even AAAS articles. To my near shock science is utterly disregarded by point of "worldview bias". - What that told me, and knowing my friend's sincerity, is that these creationist and ID loonies have done a fantastic job. The sad thing is seeing indoctrinated kids grow up and eventually run a country. - Terribly depressing. Michelle
I'm actually very interested in Christian theology, as it is quite a lot of thought going on there. But you're right, it's very thought through.
Some of it is but some of Christianity's most central stories aren't well thought through at all. They're like bad fairy tales that don't even make for a good story. The Jesus myth, for example, has holes in it that are miles wide. It makes no sense that a god who "so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son" so that those who believed in him could be saved would then neglect to tell most of the world about it for centuries, having sent a supernatural messenger to tell Mary that she was to be the Mother of God. It's an absurd story that doesn't fit together well at all, even if you accept the premise that a loving god would ever have created a hell that he would then have to save people from.
Hello Michelle D. I have many of the same type of friends. Like John said, “Let it be". When that does not work then it is all about communication. There is no discussion when comes to items of faith. I could tell you that in my faith I see two suns in the sky and there is no way you could make me think otherwise. Proof that a discussion based on faith is just a waist of time. So if your friend can use reason and not faith then you have an item of discussion. The churches have spent millions and millions of hours over a thousand years on answering questions of religion. Therefore your friend has answers available to him on almost any question you my have. You now have the internet to back you up with facts so that will help in the discussion. One of the most important items at your disposal is religion itself. If your friend is like my friends they will only use the NT and OT. When the discussion is not going the way they would like they will discard the OT completely saying the NT is God’s new words. You have all the history of mankind’s religion at your disposal and are not limited to just the bible. The bible is the foundation of their belief. What I have found is the bible is based upon older religions. There is not one original religious idea or religious thought is in the bible. Your friend will try and prove otherwise and you are able to take the discussion outside of the bible and open a whole new world of religion to your friend.
Hi Mike, thanks for the input! These discussions really are something for sure. I like your point on the Bible not being very original. It is original, certainly, as the collection that it is, but the ideas within it are definitely not very unique. I'll have to look into this a bit more. Thanks for the hint. Michelle
I'm actually very interested in Christian theology, as it is quite a lot of thought going on there. But you're right, it's very thought through.
Some of it is but some of Christianity's most central stories aren't well thought through at all. They're like bad fairy tales that don't even make for a good story. The Jesus myth, for example, has holes in it that are miles wide. It makes no sense that a god who "so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son" so that those who believed in him could be saved would then neglect to tell most of the world about it for centuries, having sent a supernatural messenger to tell Mary that she was to be the Mother of God. It's an absurd story that doesn't fit together well at all, even if you accept the premise that a loving god would ever have created a hell that he would then have to save people from. Very true, many of these stories don't make much sense, like a bad fairytale, as you say. Unfortunately, the discrepancies can be explained away, however vague, and upon these stories stands an entire monument of theology thought through from every angle. The concept of Original Sin, which I believe originated in Augustine, supports more Christian theology than any other idea. (Jews and Muslims though reject it.) I agree with what you're saying, the premises are pretty bad, but what's built on them is hard to argue with, as it is pretty good logic "firmly planted in mid-air". (I actually got that phrase from a theologian, saying the same about atheism.)
That's funny :-) Yeah, I should try that [using feminine gender pronouns for God] :-)
Maybe not; because, you might appear needlessly provocative, although it sounds like he's good for a little theological ribbing. But also, you can hardly claim you think of the Christian God, who you don't believe in and know is technically beyond gender, as feminine. It woudl sound a bit forced, no? I've always thought Bender the robot was humorously honest; in one episode he swears 'O your God!' (Curiously, the robots are given a robot Devil but no robot God.)
We can speak of God, but we speak of "the" Goddess. Very interesting thing to ponder I think.
I hadn't thought of that. The 'the' may just be a quirk of modern English-speaking neo-Goddess worshippers, who tend to have cut their teeth on a lot of mythology a la Robert Graves, who lumped them all together as the Goddess, or the Triple Goddess. To them 'the Goddess' *maybe* is more like when we say 'the lion is a mighty hunter'; it's a bit of the universal common to each particular lion. 'Al-lah' contains the Arabic version of 'the', we just typically don't think of it that way. Ditto for Pacific languages, which also tend to use 'the' a lot where English wouldn't: for example, Fijian *na Kalou*, '(the) God'. It doesn't really pan out as any deep difference in how Christians of the Southwest Pacific think of God, in my experience. Chris Kirk
Anyway, we're having fun talking. Michelle
That's good to hear.
Very true, many of these stories don't make much sense, like a bad fairytale, as you say. Unfortunately, the discrepancies can be explained away, however vague, and upon these stories stands an entire monument of theology thought through from every angle. The concept of Original Sin, which I believe originated in Augustine, supports more Christian theology than any other idea. (Jews and Muslims though reject it.) I agree with what you're saying, the premises are pretty bad, but what's built on them is hard to argue with, as it is pretty good logic "firmly planted in mid-air". (I actually got that phrase from a theologian, saying the same about atheism.)
Respectfully, I disagree. People can close their eyes, plug their ears and shout "WA-WA-WA! I'm not listening" but that's all it amounts to.
They're like bad fairy tales that don't even make for a good story. The Jesus myth, for example, has holes in it that are miles wide. It makes no sense that a god who "so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son" so that those who believed in him could be saved would then neglect to tell most of the world about it for centuries, having sent a supernatural messenger to tell Mary that she was to be the Mother of God. It's an absurd story that doesn't fit together well at all, even if you accept the premise that a loving god would ever have created a hell that he would then have to save people from.
All men throughout time have had access to God's salvation. Before Christ, they looked forward to the salvation God had promised. Since Christ, we look back. This is made clear in the story of the prophet Jonah. No, it's not just about a big fish. It's the story of God's prophet, long before Christ was born into the world, being sent to the Gentile city of Nineveh in the region of Assyria--a brutal enemy of Israel. Jonah was sent with the message, "Forty more days and Nineveh will be overturned." The story then says, "The Ninevites believed God." At that point they had received God's forgiveness and salvation. Jonah was angry and didn't believe the Ninevites deserved forgiveness, saying to God, "I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity. Now, O LORD, take my life, for it is better for me to die than to live." God replied, "Nineveh has more than a thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left, and many cattle as well. Should I not be concerned about that great city?" Jesus later teaches, "The men of Nineveh will stand up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and now one greater than Jonah is here." Matthew 12:41 God has not neglected to tell any one of his salvation. He has set the times and places for each to live and gives every man what he needs to find him and reach out to him. God is present at every time and in every place man lives. Man is his creation and he knows each one intimately. You're thinking too small.
Hi Lily, very true. I'm actually very interested in Christian theology, as it is quite a lot of thought going on there. But you're right, it's very thought through.
There's a trend today for many authors to write about how the Bible was changed, how the teaching was taken over, the mindset of the authors and why they said what they said. In that way they talk past any meaning in the Bible. The Bible as a whole, however, does have a meaning. It's complex and takes study, and people often disagree with each other on various points. But simply understanding the teaching that's actually there is fascinating in itself. It doesn't mean you have to believe it. It just means there is a meaning to be found for those who are willing to read what's there rather than continually explain it away, imo.
Hi Lily, very true. I'm actually very interested in Christian theology, as it is quite a lot of thought going on there. But you're right, it's very thought through.
There's a trend today for many authors to write about how the Bible was changed, how the teaching was taken over, the mindset of the authors and why they said what they said. In that way they talk past any meaning in the Bible. The Bible as a whole, however, does have a meaning. It's complex and takes study, and people often disagree with each other on various points. But simply understanding the teaching that's actually there is fascinating in itself. It doesn't mean you have to believe it. It just means there is a meaning to be found for those who are willing to read what's there rather than continually explain it away, imo. What you call a trend, I would call scholarship. Certainly the discovery of manuscripts in the last century shed some light on where the Bible came from, plus archaeology that has told more about the kingdoms and characters. Don't you agree? Many of these scholars are good Christians. How do you determine which ones are providing new revelations and which are "explaining away"? If Luke is considered a great historian, why aren't today's historians treated with as much reverence? Much of what has been handed down to churches comes from people hundreds of years removed from the events and languages of the original authors in a time of declining empires and very little education. Are you saying we are less smart that those people? Are you saying all of the work to understand these ancient languages, and trace all of the people who edited the Bible over the centuries is not worth it? How do you know which Bible to read? How do you know the one you have is not one that had some critical words changed, added or deleted? And please don't say that you just know. I'm really not interested in what is written on your heart.
Much of what has been handed down to churches comes from people hundreds of years removed from the events and languages of the original authors in a time of declining empires and very little education.
This is an example of what I'm talking about. You state that as if it were fact, yet it's not. Jesus rose from the dead around 30 AD. The letters of Paul, Jude, Peter, and John were written shortly after that. The Gospels were written about the same time--prior to the 2nd century. The Didache is a document written for the church. It is said, "Traces of the use of this text, and the high regard it enjoyed, are widespread in the literature of the second and third centuries especially in Syria and Egypt... Hence a date for the Didache in its present form later than the second century must be considered unlikely, and a date before the end of the first century probable." http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/didache.html Then came the letters of Clement, Polycarp, Papias and Ignatius in the late 1st to the early 2nd century AD. Following that comes the writings of Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, and Hippolytus--all before the 3rd century. If we have all this, how can the teachings to the churches be "hundreds of years removed from the events?" The New Testament writings have more ancient manuscripts than any other writing of the time because everyone was copying and passing on the letters and teachings. There are relatively little differences among these manuscripts, and none that change the meaning of the texts. Where there is a difference, it is clearly known and acknowledged in the Bible translations. My Bible makes a note of every one and tells me which come from the older manuscripts and which from more recent manuscripts. The Bibles we have are different English translations, but they say the same things. I've compared them. I read the one in English that's easiest for me to understand. If I have a question, I can always look it up in the original Greek or Hebrew. Now that that's settled, my point was there is a meaning to what is written in the Bible. It's the meaning that's interesting to me.

I use to think that the bible reflected how the people of the time wrote. That writing had not evolved to a state of understandable standards and that you needed a priest or one of the very few people of the time that could read to tell the people about the stories of religion.
Boy was I wrong. People could write contracts and stories three thousand years before the bible was written that were as good as most of us can write today.
So why were so many parts of the bible so poorly written and hard to understand?
I think one should understand the use of footnote bibles and how they were used by the church. Of course death was what you got if you had one of these footnote bibles. It is said the footnotes were used to change the stories so that the religion was accepted by the people.
It is looking to me like the stories were being changed up until the early 300’s.
No different than other stories like Santa Claus. Once the story is reached a level of acceptance the changes stop.
Now you would be a fool if you did not factor in the steps the church would take to have power. Example the church claimed half of Roman Empire using fake documents.

LilySmith;
What evidence do you have that “everyone was copying and passing on the letters"? What evidence do you have that more than a few thousand people were doing that? What is the earliest manuscript that you are aware of? Have you actually compared them to later manuscripts, or what source do you have that says there are “relatively little differences"? You can look things up in Greek or Hebrew? You never mentioned you were adept at those languages.
This is not settled. While I was still Christian, I went looking for answers to the above questions and found very different answers than what you report. I found the Trinity is an idea that came much later, that there was a schism over Mary, over what’s in the cracker, and who Jesus really was. I found there was never a time when there was “A" meaning. The arguing begins within the pages of the Bible and continues to this day. What is the New Testament about if not an argument between Jesus and the Jewish leaders?