Why Faith Fails The Christian Delusion

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Why Faith Fails The Christian Delusion Page 27

by John W. Loftus

the Hugenots was mostly the result of religious divisions and tensions" (p. 342).

  24. To read about this devastating war, see C. V. Wedgwood, The Thirty Years'

  War (New York: New York Review Books Classics, 2005).

  25. Copan, When God Goes to Starbucks: A Guide to Everyday Apologetics

  (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2008), p. 192.

  26. David S. Reynolds, John Brown, Abolitionist-The Man Who Killed

  Slavery, Sparked the Civil War and Seeded Civil Rights (New York: Alfred A.

  Knopf, 2005).

  27. To see what I mean, look at the collection of essays in Cotton Is King and

  ProSlavery Arguments V2: The Bible Argument, in the Light of Social Ethics,

  and in the Light of Ethnology, eds. Thornton Stringfellow, Chancellor Harper, et

  al. (Kessinger Publishing, 2007 reprint); Williard Swartley, Slavery, Sabbath,

  War & Women: Case Studies in Biblical Interpretation (Scottsdale, PA: Herald

  Press, 1983), pp. 31-64; and Paul Finkelman, ed., Defending Slavery.-

  Proslavery Thought in the Old South (Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2003).

  28. Copan, in When God Goes to Starbucks, writes: "Not all professing

  Christians are genuinely or consistently Christian" (p. 201).

  29. On this I recommend J. Philip Wogman, Christian Ethics: A Historical

  Intro duction (Louisville, KY: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1993). There are

  many others.

  30. On the subject of genocide, be sure to read my blog post "Psalm 137 Is a

  Genocidal Passage!" at www.debunkingchristianity.blogspot.com.

  31. Gregory Boyd is writing a book tentatively titled Jesus versus Jehovah:

  Understanding the Violent God of the Old Testament in Light of the God of the

  Cross, where he will argue that "Jesus himself repudiated the violence of the OT-

  despite his belief that this collection of writings was inspired." Boyd continues,

  "In other words, if you obey Jehovah, you're not a child of God, according to

  Jesus." Boyd rhetorically asks: "Is it possible that some divinely inspired

  material is not supposed to reveal to us what God is like but what he is not like?

  Is it possible that some material is inspired precisely because God wants us to

  follow Jesus' example and repudiate it?" See "Jesus' Repudiation of Old

  Testament Violence," Christus Victor Ministries, http://www.gregboyd.org/. This

  is theological gerrymandering if I ever saw it!

  32. See the book edited by Stanley N. Gundry, Five Views on Law and Gospel

  (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1996).

  33. See my blog "Calvinism Is Bullshit, and God Wanted Me to Say This,"

  Debunking Christianity, January 31, 2009, http://debunkingchristianity.blogspot

  .com/2009/01/calvinism-is-bullshit-and-god-wanted-me.html. As I wrote on

  page 290 of my book WIBA: "If God decrees everything that happens, then he

  can know the future of every human action since he decrees each one of them.

  But there are serious problems with such a theology. It means God decrees every

  evil deed that we do. It also means that God decrees every evil desire that we

  have to do every evil deed that we do. We cannot do otherwise. We cannot even

  desire to do otherwise. It also means God decrees everything that we believe.

  None of us can believe other than that which God decrees. Therefore, God

  decrees people to hell, since those who end up there could not have believed

  differently. I only have the harshest kinds of comments for such a theology. That

  God is an evil monster requiring nothing but disgust and loathing. Such a

  theology creates atheists and motivates me like no other theology to attempt to

  demolish the Christian faith."

  34. Bruce J. Malina and Richard L. Rohrbaugh, Social-Science Commentary

  on the Synoptic Gospels (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2003), p. 11.

  35. Ibid.

  36. Two helpful books on these disagreements written by Roger E. Olson, an

  evangelical, are The Story of Christian Theology: Twenty Centuries of Tradition

  and Reform (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press Academic, 1999), and The

  Mosaic of Christian Belief Twenty Centuries of Unity and Diversity (Downers

  Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press Academic, 2002).

  37. See the book edited by Donald K. McKim, Historical Handbook of Major

  Biblical Interpretations (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1998), which is

  composed of 643 pages.

  38. "The Parchment and Pen."

  n an essay titled "Is Yahweh a Moral Monster? The New Atheists and Old

  Testament Ethics," Dr. Paul Copan, a wellknown Christian apologist and

  president of the Evangelical Philosophical Society, attempts to combat the New

  Atheists and their dim view of biblical ethics. (If the reader has not previously

  read his article, it might be best to do so now; it's available online.)I However, it

  soon becomes apparent that his critique repeats factual errors and biases found in

  earlier biblical apologists. Copan reveals himself as just another Christian

  apologist who supports biblical genocide and other injustices. He is definitely

  not successful in demonstrating the superiority of biblical ethics over those of

  other cultures in the ancient Near East.

  MISREPRESENTING NEAR EASTERN

  CULTURES

  Copan begins by misrepresenting ancient Near Eastern legal materials in at least

  three major ways:

  1. The supposedly unique embedding of biblical laws in historical

  narratives,

  2. The use of motive clauses in law, and

  3. Distorted portrayal of ancient Near Eastern slavery laws.

  NARRATIVES IN LEGAL MATERIALS AS SUPERIOR

  According to Copan, the Bible is superior because it embeds its legal materials

  within a larger narrative that explains the history and principles behind the laws.

  He specifically states: "The absence of such narratives is glaringly apparent in

  cuneiform ANE [ancient Near Eastern] Mesopotamian law codes such as

  Hammurabi ... By contrast, cuneiform laws such as Hammurabi are never

  motivated by historical events: unlike biblical laws, no cuneiform law is ever

  motivated by reference to an historic event, a promise of wellbeing, or ... a

  divine will."

  Copan does not show evidence of any complete reading of the Code of

  Hammurabi (CH). If Copan had read the entire CH, he would see that his

  statement is patently false. The CH does have both a very lengthy prologue and

  an epilogue, which are narratives that situate the CH in a claimed historical

  context. Consider the first paragraph, which is just a fragment of a much longer

  narrative prologue:

  When the august god Anu, king of the Anunnaku deities, and the god Enlil,

  lord of heaven and earth, who determines the destinies of the land, allotted

  supreme power over all the peoples to the god Marduk, the firstborn son of

  the god Ea, exalted him among the Igigu deities, named the city of Babylon

  with its august name and made it supreme within the regions of the world

  and established for him within it eternal kingship whose foundations are as

  fixed as heaven and earth, at that time, the gods Anu and Enlil, for the

  enhancement of the wellbeing of the people named me by my name:

  Hammurabi,
the pious prince, who venerates the gods, to make justice

  prevail in the land, to abolish the wicked and the evil, to prevent the strong

  from oppressing the weak, to rise like the sun-god Shamash over all

  humankind, to illuminate the world.2

  Maybe Copan does not regard this as "history," but it differs very little from

  the "history" given in Exodus, which also refers to a god (Yahweh) who called a

  man (Moses) through whom the law was given to the people. After all, there is

  much more evidence that Hammurabi was an actual historical figure, whereas

  we have nothing about Moses outside of biblical manuscripts that are no earlier

  than the first through the third centuries BCE in the Dead Sea Scrolls.

  Moreover, the prologue and epilogue of the CH clearly enunciate principles

  for the laws. These principles can be summarized as follows:

  1. to further the wellbeing of humanity;

  2. to make justice prevail in the land;

  3. to destroy the wicked and the evil-doers;

  4. to prevent the strong from oppressing the weak;

  5. to have as equal and as complete a rulership as the sun; and

  6. to protect the orphan (or waif) and the widow.3

  So, contrary to Copan's assertions, we do find in the CH the goal of bettering

  humankind and a reference to the divine will (Shamash's will). Clearly, Copan is

  simply wrong about the CH. That alone speaks volumes about how well he

  knows these ancient Near Eastern materials, and how fair he is in making

  comparisons.

  MOTIVE CLAUSES AS SUPERIOR

  Yet another misrepresentation of Near Eastern materials occurs in Copan's

  discussions of motive clauses, which explain the reasons for enacting or

  practicing a particular law. For example, the commandment to honor father and

  mother in Exodus 20:12 is accompanied by a motive clause ("that your days may

  be long in the land which the LORD your God gives you").

  In the 1950s, a scholar named Berend Gemser argued that only biblical laws

  had motive clauses, and so biblical law was superior.4 The supposed superiority

  of motive clauses is particularly ironic because another stream of apologetics,

  led by Albrecht Alt (1883-1956), the famous German biblical scholar, claimed

  that apodictic laws made the Bible unique and superior. Apodictic laws, such as

  "Thou shalt not kill," can be formulated without conditions or motive clauses.

  Even at the time of Gemser, scholars knew that many Near Eastern laws also had

  motive clauses, and so biblical apologetics eventually shifted to explaining how

  biblical motive clauses were superior.

  Rifat Sonsino, author of Motive Clauses in Hebrew Law, thought he found

  what made biblical motive clauses superior. Copan relies heavily, and much too

  uncritically, on the work of Sonsino. In fact, the quote I highlighted above from

  Copan's essay derives almost directly from Sonsino, who wrote: "It is

  noteworthy that, unlike biblical laws, no cuneiform law is ever motivated by

  reference to an historic event, a promise of wellbeing or, for that matter, a divine

  will. In fact, in these laws the deity is completely silent, yielding its place to a

  human lawgiver whose main concern is economic rather than religious." -5

  Copan states, "Also unlike the Code of Hammurabi and other Mesopotamian

  law codes are the various `motive clauses' in the Sinaitic legislation that ground

  divine commands in Yahweh's historical activity." Yet, as we have observed, it is

  simply not true that the CH does not view itself as grounded in historical events

  or in a narrative. The general motives are made explicit in the prologue, and so

  they do not need to be repeated in individual laws.

  One has to go to footnote 23 of Copan's essay to see that Sonsino has a more

  nuanced position. While the main text of Copan's essay gives the misleading

  impression that the CH contained no motive clauses, Sonsino actually argues

  that the relative number of motive clauses is higher in the Bible. Sonsino further

  argues that that difference lies in the "form, content, and function" of motive

  clauses.6 More important, Copan does not explain why we should accept laws

  with motive clauses as superior in any way. Can we say that the commandment

  to honor your father and mother is superior to the one forbidding killing (v. 13:

  "You shall not kill") because the former has a motive clause, while the latter does

  not?

  If motive clauses make a law superior, then why are they not supplied for all

  biblical laws? Of course, Copan assumes that the motives should be deemed

  good in biblical law, where someone else could see some of them as appealing to

  self-interest. The motive for honoring one's father and mother in Exodus 20:12 is

  so that the Israelites can have a long life in the land. But is that sort of self-

  interest really a good motive to honor our father and mother?

  If we regard the welfare of others, rather than self-interest, as the standard of a

  superior law, then I can find a much better motive clause in law 137 of the CH:

  "If a man should decide to divorce a priestess or a shugitu [priestess] who bore

  him children or a naditu [priestess] who provided him with children, then he

  shall return that woman her dowry, they shall give her half (of her husband's)

  field, orchard, and property, and she shall raise her children." 7 English

  translations do not reflect the fact that the last clause can function as a motive

  clause (i.e., it could be translated as "in order that she raise her children").8 Here,

  a law is given for the good of the children, not for the self-interest of the man

  commanded to follow this law.

  Copan shows his religionist biases when he assumes that having religious

  motivations is somehow superior to having economic motivations. But that also

  depends on how one sees economics. If the economic laws are supposed to

  protect the weak from the strong, as the CH asserts, then what is wrong with

  that? This fact must be considered in light of the types of laws that have motive

  clauses. Sonsino himself admits: "Most of the motivated laws deal with

  cultic/sacral sphere. Out of 375 motivated legal prescriptions, 271 can be

  assigned to this category. This represents ca. 72% of the motivated laws, but ca.

  27% of the cultic/sacral instructions in the Pentateuchal legal corpora. The cultic

  sacral laws, in turn, constitute 78% of all the legal prescriptions in the Bible." 9

  In other words, many of the motivated laws have to do with why someone

  should sacrifice in a particular way, or not eat impure foods. Here is a typical

  cultic law with motive clauses (Leviticus 17:3-5):

  If any roan of the house of Israel kills an ox or a lamb or a goat in the camp,

  or kills it outside the camp, and does not bring it to the door of the tent of

  meeting, to offer it as a gift to the LORD before the tabernacle of the

  LORD, bloodguilt shall be imputed to that man; he has shed blood; and that

  man shall be cut off from among his people. This is to the end that the

  people of Israel may bring their sacrifices which they slay in the open field,

  that they may bring them to the LORD, to the priest at the door of the tent

  of meeting
, and slay them as sacrifices of peace offerings to the LORD.10

  So how or why would the motive clause in verse 5 be superior to that of law

  137 in the CH, which is motivated by the welfare of a divorced woman's

  children? Indeed, Sonsino calculates that there are only 51 "humanitarian

  admonitions," or 14 percent of all the motivated laws in the Hebrew Bible.11 As

  we examine the specific list of socalled motive clauses by Sonsino, it also

  becomes dolorously apparent that many of these motives offer us nothing

  particularly more ethical than what could be offered by the laws of other

  religions.

  Moreover, the impressively high counts of motive clauses in the Bible,

  relative to those of other ancient Near Eastern cultures, evaporate once you look

  at how those motive clauses are being counted. Consider the fact that Sonsino

  counts the statement, "I am Yahweh (your God)," as an entire motive clause in

  the following biblical passages: Leviticus 18:1, 22:8, 26:1-2.12 Yet, is saying "I

  am Yahweh" really a better ethical motive than saying "I am Allah" or "I am

  Shamash"? One can see that the motive counts can rise dramatically in the Bible

  by defining these sorts of formulaic statements as motive clauses.

  ADVANCES IN SLAVERYLAWS?

  When comparing the Bible to Near Eastern cultures, Copan assures us that: "On

  the other hand, Israel's laws reveal a dramatic, humanizing improvement over

  the practices of the other ancient Near Eastern peoples." Within the Bible, he

  says we also find improvement: "What is more, the three main texts regarding

  slave legislation (Exod. 21; Lev. 25; Deut. 15) reveal a morally improved

  legislation as the text progresses." So, what was so improved in the Bible

  compared to Near Eastern laws? It is difficult to see, given that Copan admits

  that: "Pentateuch's legal code in places does differentiate between Israelite and

  non-Israelite slaves (for example, Exod. 12:43, where non-Israelites are not to

  partake in the Passover); it grants remitting loans to Israelites but not to

  foreigners (Deut. 15:3); it allows for exacting interest from a foreigner but not

  from a fellow Israelite (Deut. 23:20); Moabites and Ammonites are excluded

  from the sanctuary (Deut. 23:3)." Nonetheless, Copan offers us this reassurance:

  "To stop here, as the New Atheists do, is to overlook the Pentateuch's narrative

  indicating God's concern for bringing blessing to all humanity (Gen. 12:1-3).

  Even more fundamentally, human beings have been created in God's image as

  corulers with God over creation (Gen. 1:26-27; Ps. 8)."

  If we used the intention to bring blessing to all humanity, then it is clear that

  the CH would also satisfy this requirement. Recall that the prologue to the CH

  includes this motive: "for the enhancement of the wellbeing of the people." In

  contrast to this more altruistic motive, if we look at what the "blessing" of

  humanity means in the Bible, then it is also not as benign as it appears. Copan

  quotes Genesis 12:1-3 for support. But Genesis 12 foreshadows the fact that the

  native population of Canaan mentioned in verse 6 eventually will be slaughtered

  to make way for the Israelites. Genesis 12:3 indicates that those who do not

  agree with the Abrahamic plan will be cursed. And it will eventually become

  clear that the ultimate goal is for Yahweh to be in frill control of all humanity,

  and humanity will be his slaves, and slaves to his people (see Isaiah 14:1-2

  discussed further below). In short, Copan is already working with a very biased

  view of "blessing."

  When we examine more specific supposed improvements, Copan does not tell

  the whole story. For example, he says: "Hammurabi called for the death penalty

 

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