I have been helped by reading and trying to incorporate the commands and/or language used from other attempts to better the Ten Commandments, as suggested by Bertrand Russell, Christopher Hitchens, Valerie Tarico, David Madison (in his chapter for my anthology The Case Against Miracles), the Seven Satanic Precepts, and a few I wrote in my book How to Defend The Christian Faith: Advice from an Atheist.
By doing this I am suggesting God was ignorant, incompetent and inconsiderate when he gave us his ten big ones! Had he given my suggested commands instead, he would have saved untold numbers of lives, immensely decreased the amount of suffering in the world, and exponentially increased human knowledge, and with it produced a safer, healthier world to live in.
Criticisms and suggestions are appreciated.
Whenever someone is defending faith, or is arguing that faith and reason are compatible, they should be asked which of three common meanings of the term they are thinking of. If the exact meaning of the word isn't made clear, it is almost a given that their claims will deteriorate into a mess of equivocation.
When challenged to provide evidence for the existence of God, most theists reply that their belief is based on faith. This makes it clear that, in this context, “faith” means belief without evidence. This meaning of the word also applies to the claim that faith is needed when the evidence isn't conclusive. Or in other words, when the believer says that reason can only take one so far, and one must make the decision to believe.
I recorded a video
talk for two virtual conferences this past Labor Day weekend, for the International
eConference on Atheism, put on by the Global Center for Religious Research, and for the Dragon Con Skeptic Track. I'm very grateful for these two opportunities. That video will be released sometime soon. In what
follows is the text of my talk. Please share if you want others to discuss it with you. Enjoy the discussion!
Today I’m arguing,
along the same lines as Christopher Hitchens did, that “What can be asserted
without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence.” [God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything (New York,
Twelve. 2007), p.150.] Specifically I’m arguing that “Miracle Claims Asserted Without Relevant Objective Evidence Can Be
Dismissed. Period!”
I think all reasonable
people would agree. Without any relevant objective evidence miracle claims
shouldn’t be entertained, considered, believed, or even debunked. I intend to go
further to argue that as far as we can tell, all, or almost all miracle assertions, lack any relevant objective evidence, and as such, can be dismissed out of
hand, per Hitchens.
[Another summer re-run.]
We nonbelievers claim that a perfectly good, loving being would never have created hell, but according to most Christians we are simply wrong. God is loving, they say, but he is also just — and justice demands that evil-doers be punished. Without hell, after all, where would the Hitlers, Stalins, and Ted Bundys of this world end up? In heaven?
This is a common argument, which means that many must find it persuasive, but my guess is that those who do simply haven't given it sufficient thought. It's very easy to see the flaws in it.
To begin with, hell isn't only for serious evil-doers: standard Christian doctrine maintains that we are all deserving of eternal punishment and that anyone who doesn't accept God's offer of salvation ends up there. A second thing to keep in mind is that even the worst evil-doers aren't necessarily sent to hell — not if at some point they become sincere believers. Ted Bundy, for instance, claimed to have accepted Jesus before being executed, and if that's true then on the standard view he did end up in heaven.
One therefore cannot justify hell on the grounds that evil-doers must be punished. But more importantly, can one still maintain that God is just given this doctrine? Does it make sense that all of us are deserving of eternal punishment, or that those who accept Jesus are forgiven?
Ziony Zevit is the Distinguished Professor in Bible and Northwest Semitic Languages in the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies at the American Jewish University. He has done widely respected work on the religion of ancient Israel (see Zevit 2001; 2013).
