Wrestling with Religion

Born a sheep in a fold shepherded by an anthropomorphic God who didn't hold up to critical inquiry, I became agnostic in my teens, but I was a convinced atheist with regard to the god of Moses, the all-smiting Sky King who offends morality as much as common sense (if that is possible). A white-bearded genocidal Paul Bunyan enthroned on puffy clouds compels disbelief. Anthropomorphism may be unavoidable because of human vanity, but it works only if bracketed as metaphor. Otherwise, it's a high road to atheism. Still, I hunger for some reason to entertain the half-comforting, half-absurd tropes of the God of Abraham, Jesus, and Muhammad and understand at least three experiential bases for belief.      I recently discussed the easiest one. It's pretty simple, even cold blooded. Even if the existence of God (however defined) can't be proved, still, without some overarching value system, life can seem absurd, the empty repetition that Albert Camus relates to the myth of Sis...

  Pelagius at a "thin" place Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting: The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star,       Hath had elsewhere its setting                   And cometh from afar:          Not in entire forgetfulness,                  And not in utter nakedness, But trailing clouds of glory do we come                    From God, who is our home. William Wordsworth's "Ode: Intimations of Immortality" expresses a Romantic faith in the innocence of a newborn child, not a foreign idea today, but one that in 418 earned the Celtic teacher Pelagius excommunication and condemnation by the Roman Emperor. Augustine of Hippo's victory over Pelagius gave us the heresy Pelagianism a...

James Hall If the creator of the universe--the God of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam--is all-good, all-wise, all-just, and all-knowing, why does shit happen? If Jesus (or whatever you call the creative Word) truly loves us, why not a happy theme-park world--or at least an all-inclusive resort? Why wars, plagues, famines, and earthquakes? If a Creator is defined as infinitely good, wise, and powerful--and if good is understood in human terms--the world as we know it proves he doesn't exist. Part of the definition must be wrong. God either is not good (in terms of human understanding) or must have limited powers or planning abilities. It seems that even an omnipotent ten-year-old (admittedly a terrifying idea) could make at least a few improvements.      James Hall's Knowledge, Belief, and Transcendence: Philosophical Problems in Religion (1975) parses arguments for and against traditional theism in excruciating detail, dotting every logical i and crossing every epist...

  There is something rotten in metaphors that personify God, that call the creator a he (or even a she ). If God is like a human being, he's like a bad one. The worst form of human government is that of an "almighty king," especially if his officers insist he's never wrong. Suppose the king threatens to torture you unless you praise him. That would be despicable. But eternal torture? That would be infinitely despicable. Suppose a king invents arbitrary laws, governs by fear, and condemns you for being born. No matter what you've done, you're criminal because of your ancestry, but he will "save" you if you worship him. Suppose you lived in such an unjust kingdom. Wouldn't the high road be rebellion--anything not to abet such a tyrant? If God is subject to human standards, then the purest moral stance is that of Satan in Paradise Lost : "Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heav'n" (1:263). The powers and policies of the Abrahamic ...

  James L. Kugel describes two distinct concepts of God in the Bible (pp. 107-118). The early Hebrew God is a tribal deity, proudly superior to Ba'al but still a face in a polytheistic crowd, possibly paired with a goddess. He wasn't the sole god but merely the god that his chosen tribe was obliged to worship no others "before" (Exodus 20:5). Like Athena, Apollo, and Santa Claus, he is supernatural but corporeal, a gendered person with hands and feet, a front and a back, located in time and and space. In Genesis 2-3, after creating the world, Yahweh breathes, speaks, walks with audible footsteps, and can't see Adam and Eve when they hide.  The same corporeal deity, appears on Mount Sinai--a particular place at a specific time, refuting his omnipresence--and tells Moses, “When my glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft in the rock and cover you with my hand until I have passed by.   Then I will remove my hand and you will see my back; but my face must not be s...