50 Popular Beliefs That People Think Are True

by Harrison, Guy P.

  Rather than list a long string of prophecies that are flawed in one way or another, let's look closely at one major prophecy that most people are familiar with. I feel like I know this one very well because I have seen it with my own eyes.

  VISIT TO A PROPHECY

  I'm not sure why, but I reach out and touch the yellow stone of Jerusalem's famed Western Wall. I do not believe there is any point to this other than to make a tangible connection with a place millions of other people view as extremely important and intensely sacred. I suppose maybe I am trying to channel some of that human passion, to see if I can feel some of what they feel, if only for a moment. Or maybe I'm just nervous and trying to blend in with the believers around me. The surface of the gigantic wall is old and rugged. Folded papers of various sizes fill virtually every crack in the wall. These are written prayers, stuffed into a portal to the divine by believers who hope that a god will read them. On both sides of me, Jewish men with gray beards and black hats rock back and forth. Prayers stream out of them in the form of endless rhythmic chants. I can't understand any of it, but there is an obvious commitment to each word.

  Although there is no agreement about whom he favors, what he desires of his followers, or even if he exists or not, the God of Abraham certainly has made an impression upon humankind. Approximately half of the world's population currently believes he is real. Numerous versions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam declare him to be not only the creator of Earth and the universe, but also relevant and involved in the affairs of society today. If Yahweh/God the Father/ Allah had an address, I'm guessing it would be right here in Jerusalem somewhere.

  Earlier I spent hours exploring the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, just a short walk from the Western Wall. Run by rival Christian sects, the site contains an odd forced collaboration of shrines. The building stands over the precise patch of land where Jesus is believed to have been executed some two thousand years ago. Obviously it is profoundly sacred to many Christians. The body of Adam, believed to be the first human, is also said to lie beneath the floor here. Christian or not, one cannot help but be captivated by the bustling mix of sweaty tourists, dazed pilgrims, shuffling monks, pickpockets, fanatics, schizophrenics, and genuinely nice people who share the dim hallways. But Christians are not the main attraction in Jerusalem. Jews and Muslims dominate my attention here.

  I see a Jewish man carrying a baby. He has an assault rifle slung over his shoulder, a reminder of all the hate and tension that partly define the Holy Land. Of those people who can be identified by their clothing, I see only groups of Jews and groups of Muslims. Never do I see a mixed group strolling along in casual conversation. It is odd to see a society ripped apart believe in the same god. I wonder what the future holds for Jerusalem. Will these people go on killing one another at a measured pace, or will the streets be turned into rivers of blood again as happened during the Crusades centuries ago? Will a day come when the fiery blast of a nuclear warhead finally quiets the hate once and for all? Many believers in the God of Abraham say they are confident that the world will end in a chaotic bloodbath of destruction very soon. Of course, people have been saying this for many centuries so it has lost much of its shock value. But ideas about “God's plan for the world” are still profoundly interesting in Jerusalem. Armageddon just feels closer here—maybe because it is. Hundreds of millions of people believe that their god is coming soon and this is the place where he will first appear. This will be the first battlefield in the final war. But that prophecy concerns the future, what about something that has already happened?

  The entire nation of Israel and its capital, Jerusalem, are a fulfillment of divine prophecy, according to millions of Christians and Jews. The very existence of this nation is seen by many as conclusive proof that Judaism and Christianity are accurate religions. I think about this as I walk the streets of this young country that feels so old. Are my feet treading on magical dust? Was this nation really created by a god in order to keep his promise to the Jews? Maybe, but I don't think that would be the best available explanation we have. I know another, far less extraordinary, story of how Israel was created. And this one does not require a god, magic, or even faith.

  For many centuries Jews throughout the world held a strong belief that this land had been promised to them by their god and that it would one day be a nation for Jews. For many this was not seen as a mere wish or hopeful thinking. They viewed it as a dream they had to make come true by any means necessary. The creation of a Jewish nation in Palestine would happen someday, somehow. The constant persecution inflicted by Christians upon Jews in Europe was no doubt additional motivation for them to dream of their own country. But not all Jews were content to hope, pray, and wait. Many of them worked to make it happen. Zionism became an international movement to create a Jewish homeland. Men like Theodor Herzl (1860-1904) dedicated much of their lives to founding a new nation for Jews. Many wealthy and influential Jews around the world pushed hard for it. Over time, many Christians supported the goal. They too saw it as something God wanted. The horrors of the Holocaust helped make the newly formed United Nations and the governments of the United Kingdom and United States agreeable to the idea of a Jewish state, and by 1948 it came to pass.

  This event was historic and important to world affairs, no doubt, but the important question here is why a god would be given credit for it when humans clearly did all the work every step of the way. Perhaps, as some claim, people were the instruments of God in achieving the goal. But there is no evidence for this. Having been to Israel, I can attest that all the buildings, homes, and streets appear to be humanmade. Nothing I saw suggested that any government buildings or flagpoles miraculously sprung from the soil. Then US president Harry Truman was a Christian who was well aware of the idea that God had promised the Jews a homeland in the Middle East. Are we to believe that he was under the spell of God when he decided to officially recognize the new state of Israel? Isn't it far more likely that he simply was influenced by the geopolitics of the day and perhaps his own personal religious beliefs?

  MY PROPHECIES ARE BETTER THAN YOUR PROPHECIES

  The biggest clue that something is wrong with prophecy-as-proof arguments is that they only impress people who are already committed to the particular religion making the claims. We don't see Jews flocking to Islam the moment they hear about the “split Moon” prophecy. Hindus are not converting to Judaism and Christianity by the millions upon hearing that the creation of Israel was a divine promise fulfilled by the Abrahamic god. Most Sikhs are not won over by claims that the life of Jesus was accurately predicted within the Bible. If there was one religion that really did have an important prediction, made many centuries or thousands of years ago, and it specifically described an important event, with great accuracy and detail, then this religion would have an overwhelming advantage over all of its rivals. Imagine if seventh-century Islamic scrolls were discovered this year and included the following prediction:

  In a year to be called 1969, a chariot of metal will fly to the Moon in three days carrying three men named Neil, Buzz, and Michael. Two of the men will walk upon the surface clad in gleaming white suits. They all will return home and safely splash upon the sea.

  Now, if the scrolls' age could be verified and it was determined that they had never been known to the modern world (so they could not have influenced events), we would have a very impressive prophecy. We might all be Muslims by the end of the week. But we have never seen anything remotely like this. No religion today, or ever, has been able to dominate the world's believers. There has always been disagreement and splintering of the mass of believers because no religion has an advantage on evidence, logical arguments, or prophecies.

  A key reason that “fulfilled” religious prophecies are still embraced by many people around the world is that most are still unfamiliar with the simple ways in which one can cut through fog and spin to recognize empty claims for what they are. These “fulfilled prophecies” are nothing more than vague
predictions that can be easily analyzed and shown not to necessarily rely on supernatural events. When confronted with one of these divine-prediction-come-true claims, always be sure to poke it and prod it with an inquiring mind to see if it's worthy of your trust.

  PROPHECY CHECKLIST

  Keep the following points in mind when thinking about supernatural predictions:

  Was the prediction made before the event? Sometimes they aren't. Psychics and Nostradamus enthusiasts have been known to pull this trick. One always has to check.

  Was the prediction specific enough to make it clear that it could only mean one thing, or is it so vague that it could apply to many things and be interpreted in many ways?

  Is it a prediction of something that people could have accomplished by natural means without a god's help?

  Are the odds favorable for the prophecy to come true no matter what? A prediction of victory in a war between two sides, for example, is not impressive because there is a fifty-fifty chance of being right.

  Could it just be a coincidence or something that was bound to happen anyway? Predictions of economic hard times, natural disasters, wars, and so on mean nothing because those things have been occurring over and over for millennia.

  Keep in mind that when many predictions are made, some are bound to come true by chance alone. Remember the old saying: even a broken clock shows the correct time twice per day.

  GO DEEPER…

  Books

  Allan, Tony. Myths of the World: The Illustrated Treasury of the World's Greatest Stories. New York: Duncan Baird, 2009.

  Dennett, Daniel. Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon. New York: Penguin, 2007.

  Other Sources

  Humanist (magazine).

  If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer.

  —Matthew 21:21

  Why won't God heal amputees?

  —WhyWontGodHealAmputees.com

  During my travels on six continents I always made sure to ask people about their religious beliefs. Religion fascinates me and I understand its importance to history and contemporary culture. The many conversations I had with believers taught me a lot about how they think about their particular religions and what they feel is important. A statement I heard over and over was: “I pray.” The world's believers pray to their gods often and with great enthusiasm, it seems. They may worship different supernatural beings, revere contradictory holy books, and follow different rules, but they all pray. So what is this thing called prayer, why is it so popular, and, most important, does it work?

  Like everything else in religion, prayer means different things to different people but most commonly it is nothing more than an attempt to establish some kind of a communication link with a god. It can be in the form of a request for something like healing from illness, world peace, or a new bicycle for Christmas. Prayer can also be a “thank you” or an unselfish form of worship, a way of showing respect and reverence to a god or gods. But when people say that prayer “works,” they usually mean that they asked for something and their god delivered it. Based on my interviews and research, I believe that this aspect of prayer—asking and getting—is one of the most popular justifications for religious belief worldwide. When I ask Catholics, Protestants, Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs, Mormons, Jews, and so on to explain how they know their gods are real, an answer I hear almost every time is, “my prayers were answered.”

  The amazing thing about this common confidence in prayer is that there is no proof to back it up. There have been studies designed to test the ability of prayer to help sick people, but the results are not convincing. Nonetheless, it seems that billions of people are confident that their gods not only hear their requests but often respond to them positively. There clearly is a problem here. If billions of prayer requests are being acted on every day, then it should be easy to document and establish this as a real phenomenon. But nobody has ever been able to do it. How can this be? Surely all of these people who say prayer works are not lying. They are not insane. So what are they talking about?

  First of all, I should note that challenging the claim that gods answer prayers is not necessarily a total condemnation of the act of praying. It seems clear that people can gain some psychological benefits from it. It might be helpful for some by making them feel unified with others who also pray, or it could provide a sense of peaceful solitude. Many Buddhists do not pray to a god but they do meditate, a ritual that can be very similar to prayer, and they seem to gain practical benefits from it.1 If praying lowers one's blood pressure and heart rate, then it may be beneficial, but that is not proof of anything supernatural.

  Those who are convinced from personal experience that prayers are acted upon in favorable ways by a god are most likely falling victim to confirmation bias, that troublesome habit we all have of emphasizing and remembering things that confirm what we believe while ignoring and forgetting things that contradict our beliefs. Unfortunately, very few schools and families teach children critical thinking skills or encourage skepticism. So it's no surprise that many children grow up to become adults who think that their prayers are answered when a bit of simple record keeping could prove otherwise. Claims of “answered prayers” seem to rest on the same foundation that professional psychics rely on to make a living: believers remember the hits and forget the misses. So when someone prays for a new job and then gets it a month later, he is likely to credit prayer without any thought given to his efforts to land that job as well as all the other prayer requests for things that never materialized.

  The idea that prayers are answered by “my god” comes with that insurmountable contradiction problem raised in the chapters about belief in gods and religious preference. How can the claim of answered prayers be accepted when so many people in very different belief systems talking to very different gods make the exact same claim? For example, how can it be that a Hindu, Wiccan, Muslim, Christian, and ancient Roman all prayed and received positive supernatural results? One may have asked Ganesha to heal a sick aunt and another asked Allah to relieve his migraine headaches. The Wiccan wanted a tree to grow tall and strong. Meanwhile, the Christian asked Jesus to cure a dying father and the Roman asked Jupiter for a new chariot. How are we to explain it if they all claimed to have had their prayers answered? The universe is just not big enough to contain Jesus, Allah, Ganesha, and Jupiter. Based on their core claims, Christianity, Islam, Wicca, Hinduism, and ancient Roman religion cannot all be true. Maybe one of them is right or maybe none of them are right. Yet I have heard repeatedly from Christians, Muslims, and Hindus that their prayers are answered favorably. They claim to pray to their specific god in their specific way and get positive results. And, of course, this is seen by them as proof that their religion is the accurate one and their god or gods are the real ones. Some of these people, or all of them, must be mistaken. To push the point further, even if one religion is valid and all its claims are true, its followers should still be skeptical of the power of prayer and how they measure its success. They only have to look around the world and acknowledge the obvious: that just about anyone can be convinced that prayers are answered no matter what is really going on. Today's intellectually honest Christian or Muslim should be troubled by the idea that her “answered prayers” are a real phenomenon but the “answered prayers” of animists, pagans, and so many others over the last several thousand years are not.

  THE MOST IMPORTANT PRAYER OF ALL

  As a habit, I also observe and learn as much as I can about the poorest people in any city or country I visit. Global poverty, particularly as it relates to children, is an important issue for me. I founded a small charity that raised more than $100,000 for UNICEF, and I have written numerous published commentaries and news articles about the poorest of the poor. I have seen, smelled, and touched this jagged edge of human existence, and it is not pretty. The slums of Africa and India changed me. Actually, it's more like they wounded me. Forever. I saw the tiny bodies of child beggars twiste
d and tormented by malnutrition, polio, and elephantiasis. I saw the vacant stare of listless babies who were riding out a death sentence for the crime of choosing the wrong society to be born into. My small efforts to raise money and awareness for the poor have nothing to do with saving the world (it won't) or posing to appear heroic (there are easier and less disturbing ways to do that). The truth is, I do it purely for selfish reasons. It helps me push back against the sounds and images of the poor people who haunt my mind. It's a comfort thing, my simple way of feeling a little less uncomfortable for being born over on the lucky side of fate.

  One thing I noticed about the poorest places on Earth is that they are also the most religious places on Earth. Atheists are scarce in those parts. The many millions of people who try their best to make do on a few dollars a day tend to be devout believers. And whether they are Muslims in Syria, Hindus in India, or Christians in Haiti, they pray frequently and they pray hard. I've seen many of them speaking to their gods and was struck by their passion. And this is where I found the most glaring problem of all with the claim that prayer works.

  In the developing world, approximately ten million babies under the age of five die each year in poverty. They die because they couldn't get a two-dollar vaccine, a cup of clean water, or fifty cents worth of food. This is a stunning statistic and few people in wealthy nations know about it. Sure, everyone knows that there are suffering children around the world. But I don't think very many know just how many of them die each year, and I don't think very many people pause to consider how much suffering and agony this toll translates to every day. It's nearly a double Holocaust—every year. Don't underestimate the horror of death by dysentery or some other disease that could have been prevented. It's usually a slow, cruel death, and parents trapped in extreme poverty, with feelings of love and responsibility like any other parent—have to watch their children slip away from them.