The Barbaric God of The Bible

[Written by John W. Loftus using a different email address he no longer has access to. First published in Feb 2006]

One thing is sure to me. The Triune God in the Bible simply cannot be describing the God who exists. That God is a barbaric God. He is a hateful, racist, sexist God.

Consider these stories: In the Flood story we’re told God wanted to destroy all mankind. In Moses’ day God wanted to destroy all of the Israelites. In Joshua’s day God wanted the Israelites to kill all of the inhabitants of the Promised Land. Saul was told by God to destroy all of the Amalekites. According to Jonah, God was going to destroy the people of Nineveh. God also destroyed and scattered the northern tribes of Israel because he was displeased with them. God allowed the accuser to destroy Job’s health and family life just to win a “bet.” In the New Testament, God will destroy all unbelievers in the lake of fire. He’s a pretty barbaric God, if you ask me. This God is simply the reflection of ancient barbaric peoples.

Christians think the Militant Muslims are wrong for wanting to kill free loving people in the world, and they are. But the only difference between these Muslims and the Christian Biblical God is that they simply disagree on who should be killed. They both agree people should be killed; they just disagree on who should die.

Six Degrees of Separation: Between Modern Christians and Jesus

The gospels stand in the way

It is so common for churchgoers to assume they know what Jesus was like. This knowledge comes from what their clergy tell them, the content of favorite hymns—and sometimes by selectively reading the gospels, that is, returning to comforting teachings of Jesus remembered from childhood. 
 
The content of sermons and hymns is based on what can be found—and what is carefully ignored—in the gospels. But the gospels are not, in fact, a portal to Jesus information. They are a barrier. So many devout Christian seem not to have a clue that this is the case, and, moreover, why it is the case. Let’s look at six ways in which the gospels fail to deliver.

Review of: "Determined: A Science of Life Without Free Will" by Robert M. Sapolsky

Determined: A Science of Life Without Free Will by Robert M. Sapolsky
Penguin Publishing Group | 2023 | ISBN: 9780525560982, 052556098X | Page count: 528 | Wikipedia article | Goodreads entry and quotations from the book | Google Books entry with preview | Amazon link

Determined is Robert M. Sapolsky's skeptical take on the topic of free will. The topic is relevant to this blog since conceptions of free will have a long (and contentious) history in Christianity and other religions. In the religion debate, the issue of free will is likely to come up at some point, given that religious conceptions of free will tend to be pretty far from the scientific picture. See for example:

• My Rambling Thoughts On Free Will, Determinism, and Making Choices by John W. Loftus at 4/26/2023
• Christianity in the Light of Science: Critically Examining the World's Largest Religion (Goodreads entry), Part 3: Science and Salvation, especially Chapter 9: Free Will
• My Foreword to God and Horrendous Suffering, ed. John Loftus by Stephen Law, May 18, 2022 (mentions free will as a strategy by theists to solve the problem of evil)

As Sapolsky's book demonstrates at great length, free will is nowhere to be found in a scientific study of the human organism. Now, maybe some future scientific discovery will rescue free will, and therefore breathe some life into religious talking points that assume free will, but the trend so far is not encouraging for those who chain their theistic wagons to it.

Determined is a fairly high-profile book in its niche, and has attracted its share of comment. Rather than rewrite everything in the existing commentary, I'll link to some of it. If anything in the rest of my review seems hard to follow, consider coming back here to read some or all of these:

Paul Moser decisively answers the evidential problem of horrendous suffering via assertions!

Philosopher Paul Moser answers the evidential problem of horrendous suffering via assertions! This is so unenlightening! He asserts his faith despite this problem, But is this doing his readers any good? Is he helping them through this serious problem for faith? FACEBOOK LINK.

Ten Jesus Quotes—Among Many—Christians Could Do Without

What would Jesus do?—Well, that’s anybody’s guess

Let’s start on a positive note—before I move on to discuss very problematic Jesus quotes from the gospels. Of course, there are good Jesus quotes, and I like to combine Matthew 7:1-2 with John 8:7, which are, in fact, hard for conservative Christians especially to deal with:
 
“Do not judge, so that you may not be judged. For the judgment you give will be the judgment you get, and the measure you give will be the measure you get.”
 
“Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.”
 
But evangelicals savor despising gay people, feminists, and those who campaign for women’s rights (such as access to abortion). So they have ways to work around these compassionate teachings of Jesus, not to judge, not to throw stones. Their severe Christianity demands strident opposition. So Jesus can take a hike—at least they turn their backs on these quotes of their lord and savior: they can’t mean what they seem to mean.

On the Resurrection: Evidences, Vol. 1, by Gary Habermas

This book by my friend Gary Habermas just came out. It's volume 1 of an expected 4 volumes. They represent the culmination of decades of research that he spent on a lifelong quest to defend the resurrection of Jesus. Other notables who have done a great deal of research on the resurrection include William Lane Craig, Michael Licona, and NT Wright. 

The reason why so much research has been devoted to the resurrection claim is because it is the linchpin upon which everything else hangs when it comes to a  Bible believing faith. If Jesus was raised from the dead their faith is not in vain, Paul tells them. But it also provides the justification for believing in a miracle working god of the Bible, including the story of the garden of Eden, Abraham's attempted sacrifice of Isaac, the Exodus, and all other miracles, including the virgin birthed son of a god. It also guarantees the return of Jesus, and his promise of everlasting reward in a heavenly existence.   

Gary and I have met and have emailed each other for more than a dozen years. He invited me to Skype into a class of PhD students [in June 2020] who were majoring in Apologetics to discuss my book, The Case Against Miracles. 

Having known about his upcoming set of books I suggested a blurb he could use based on his previous writings:

My friend Gary Habermas has produced the most exhaustive defense of the indefensible claim of faith in the resurrection of Jesus that has ever been attempted. No non-Christian who cares to argue otherwise can avoid it. [Sent on February 18, 2020]

Science and Biblical Literalism

Christians take the Bible literally until such time as the literal interpretation becomes indefensible. Then they find some other meaning, no matter how strange. In other words, it says what it says until refuted by reason, morality, and/or science; then it says something other than what it says.

A Big Chunk of Cult Posturing in John’s Gospel

A mighty stream of pompous theobabble

Insight into Christian origins is provided by three texts, written by a man who never met Jesus. (1) The apostle Paul states in Galatians 1:11-12: “For I want you to know, brothers and sisters, that the gospel that was proclaimed by me is not of human origin, for I did not receive it from a human source, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ.” A revelation as he imagined it, unless you’re willing to credit visions claimed by hundreds of other religions. (2) He also imagined that Jesus was a dying-rising savior god; that is, those who believe in this hero are entitled to eternal life, as he states in Romans 10:9: “…if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” (3) In I Thessalonians 4:17, Paul assured his followers that their dead Christian relatives and friends would be the first to rise to meet Jesus when he arrives on the clouds: “Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up in the clouds together with them to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will be with the Lord forever.”

Zeke Piestrup On His New Film, "Satan's Guide to the Bible!"

[This is a guest post by Zeke Piestrup about his new film. Don't let the cartoonish background fool you as it quotes from Bible scholars, especially Hector Avalos and Bart Ehrman.]

Praise John Loftus for allowing me to grab the wheel of DC, in hopes of steering y’all straight to my new flick: Satan's Guide to the Bible! Satan is the substitute Sunday school teacher. Today’s lesson? All the Bible secrets the children’s pastor learned at Christian seminary, but won’t share. He’d get fired. Below is a trailer and the full movie!

My Virgin Birth Debate Slides

I've had some difficulty posting these slides from an online debate with Jimmy Akin, which was hosted by Capturing Christianity. Initially we had agreed to 20 minute openers but decided 10 minutes was enough. Below is my 20 minute slide presentation, which I extended a bit. It puzzles me a great deal why this information doesn't cause more believers to abandon the virgin myth. This is what led me to doubt the gospels as a whole. Enjoy. Please share!

Rampant Gospel Confusion, Number 2: Why Four Different Endings?

Theology is written this way, not history

Devout scholars have been pondering—and arguing about—the four gospel endings for a long time now. Is there any way that these different endings qualify as history? So much has been written about this, so I’m going to mention here just a few of the issues that come to mind. For those who want to insist that the story of Jesus is supremely important, the end of his story—well, the end of his supposed earthly existence—should be of the best possible quality. But that’s not what we find. Let’s look at each of the four endings.

Two Good Reviews of My Debate with Jimmy Akin On the Virgin Birth

I was approached by "Capturing Christianity" to debate Marian miracles in general. But I didn't want to do that for a number of reasons. So I got them to focus on the virgin birth, a specialty of mine. 

In the debate I didn't want to reward Jiimmy Akins by commenting on his opener, which I considered an apologist's trick. It's used to take charge of a debate. Akins did not defend any of his premises so there was nothing to do. I wanted to spend all my available time on the unevidenced uncorroborated ancient hearsay testimonial claim of the virgin birth itself.

Dr. Vincent Torley reviewed it and said:

It seemed to me that Loftus was questioning premise P5 of Akin’s argument (that the New Testament is inspired by God), but unfortunately, he did not explicitly say so, preferring to focus on his own argument against the Virgin Birth, which I have to say was very well-presented. Loftus made a powerfully convincing case that miracle claims should rest on solid evidence, and that belief in the Virgin Birth does not. Loftus highlighted the numerous historical problems Matthew’s and Luke’s historical narratives succinctly and cogently. The Skeptical Zone.

Here's an excellent debunking of what Jimmy Akins said. Thanks go out to Dr. Aaron Adair and the Godless Engineer for this! Adair and GE claim that I did very well!