Dawkins : "I'm a cultural Christian".

[mintogrubb.livejournal.com]

Professor Richard Dawkins has said the he is ' A Cultural Christian'.
In a news story on the BBC website, he declared that he has no wish to see Christmas cancelled, or see Britain lose any part of it's Christian heritage. This may come as a surprise to some, but his website tends to direct its venom towards the more negative aspects of religious belief.

These include the Catholic Church's stance on child molesting priests, it's opposition to contraception, and its condemnation of gay people. Yet Protestant believers come in for criticism too. It isn't simply a belief in Adam and Eve that Dawkins criticises, it's the Old Testament's account of Joshua's conquests, the concept of Hell and the moral standards taught in the O.T. that also provoke his ire.

Well, my take on it is as follows -
the Jews didn't really do the conquest of Canaan like the Bible says,in fact they didn't conquer Canaan at all - Joshua's campaign was largely a propaganda exercise done in a later period;
the concept of Hell as a place of eternal torment rests upon misinterpretation and misunderstanding of certain Biblical passages, as well as a certain amount of Hellenistic influence;
the sexism, racism and homophobia are all there in the Torah, but the Jews themselves got over a lot of it before Jesus came along and finished the job.

If we were to teach History in school and pay more attention to events in the Levant around the Bronze Age, it would do a lot to dispel the negative influence that religious mythology still has on society. We can dump all that stuff and still have a version of Christianity that is different from Atheism. And, yes, I would be happy to explain the specifics in the comments - if I get any:)

Comments

[a-new-machine.livejournal.com]

A fair enough point. I saw it differently when I phrased it, sort of the negative space of what you're saying here. If nothing in the scriptures was true, then the opposite of the scriptures were true, then the facts of Jesus' life and death would be untrue. He would never have lived or died. Sorta more like saying "Well, you don't exist, therefor your birth certificate is inaccurate, because you were, in fact, never born." I actually didn't really reverse causality - I posited that the scriptures say X, and not just "not X" but "the opposite of X" is true. Therefor Christian theology, which undeniably shares some necessary facts with the Scriptures, is shaken to its core by the Scriptures being opposite-of-true.

[pastorlenny.livejournal.com]

I actually didn't really reverse causality

The reversal of causality is inherent in any assertion that Christian theology is at its core contingent upon the New Testament scriptures. Christian theology predates the New Testament scriptures. Things cannot be contingent on things they predate.

This is more than just a "fair enough point." It is an obvious and foundational reality that you did not previously consider. I would strongly suggest considering this now-obvious reality. It may have more significance than you immediately realize.

I posited that the scriptures say X, and not just "not X" but "the opposite of X" is true.

I still don't think you're grasping the relationship between the Church and scripture. There were documents that said "the opposite of X." They were falsified.

Do you believe false claims just because they appear in documents?

[a-new-machine.livejournal.com]

You're just repeating yourself. If the opposite of what the document says is true, then Christian theology (yes, even the theology that predates the Christian theology) is false. If Jesus was never born and never died (a central claim of the scriptures) there's no Christianity. THAT is what I'm saying. Not that the birth certificate is false therefor the person never existed, but that if the person never existed the birth certificate is false.

[pastorlenny.livejournal.com]

Yes, if children give birth to their parents, we have a serious problem. Also if you get thirstier from drinking water.

[a-new-machine.livejournal.com]

You keep hammering at this, and it's obvious you're not reading what I'm saying. The Scriptures say X. You say Christian theology has no reliance on the scriptures' accuracy. So I say, "Well, let all of the scriptures be false - down to the last detail." This means that historically, any claim made by the scriptures is false, right down to the existence of Jesus. Yes, I understand that the scriptures post-date Christianity. I'm just saying that you must defend at least some parts of them for accuracy, because if they are proven 100% inaccurate, then Jesus never existed. That is, if they are proven a 100% incorrect statement of the facts - like a birth certificate for a birth that never happened - then Christianity collapses. I'm not reversing causality. I'm saying there's an overlap in what the Scriptures say and what must be true for Christianity to be valid theology. Do you disagree? Or do you think that if the scriptures were proven 100% false, down to the statement that Jesus existed, Christianity would survive?

[pastorlenny.livejournal.com]

Obviously, if Christ never existed, Christianity would not exist. The issue is therefore not scripture -- but the existence of Christ.

[a-new-machine.livejournal.com]

Obviously, if Christ never existed, Christianity would not exist

Would not be true, I think is more correct. If thetans do not exist, is Scientology merely a bad dream? If Buddha never existed, and was just an amalgamation of various folk sayings given a character, then Buddhism still exists.

[pastorlenny.livejournal.com]

There are all sorts of assertions we could make about Christianity without a Christ. But they are all consequences of His existence or non-existence -- not of documents pertaining to that existence or non-existence.

[a-new-machine.livejournal.com]

We're in agreement, but arguing like we're not. If Christ did not exist, the Scriptures are false, I'll grant. However, in the reverse, if the Scriptures are in no way accurate, then Christ did not exist (because everything the Scriptures say is in fact untrue, and they say he existed) and Christianity is at least untrue. So, to get back to the original point... you must defend some element of the scriptures' accuracy. So you can't just handwave away challenges to the accuracy of the scriptures as irrelevant.

Man it took a long time to get here from there.

[pastorlenny.livejournal.com]

If everything the Scriptures say is untrue, then we have a bigger problem -- because water makes you thirstier and children give birth to their parents. Our entire experience of reality is thus falsified.