I started at Cape May’s First Methodist Church Attended Sunday School, Children’s Choir, and Altar-boy (lit the altar candles). Attended Summer Bible School at the competing Presbyterian Church on Decatur. I could see the contradictions, especially with respect to Catholics, whom most protestants denigrate. They didn’t eat meat on Fridays, and it was a big-time sin to miss Mass. When they reminded me that their church existed more than a thousand years before Methodists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians et al, I wondered: Why doesn’t Jesus/HolySpirit/God straighten this out?? I then also wondered why it took more than 198,000 years of Sapiens existence before the big guy sent a savior? Well, some day I’ll figure that out.
Then came Navy where I’m constantly in the mix of “other religions” — yep, from Mormon to Muslim to Scientology. I listened to them all…fascinated that they were very much alike, yet very much different, especially Scientology - big in SoCal. Finally, as much as we know about the feminine - wouldn’t a female make a better god?
In order to simplify my own thinking, I came across some writing about Holy Books, especially on what I termed “obscurification of ideas.” I’ve read much of The Bible. A little Book of Mormon. Even less of the Koran. Just a little Hubbard’s science fiction to understand the roots of Scientology. Of course, I’ve also read all about Buddha, Hinduism, and the other Asian variations. All worthwhile to read.
So, here is my maxim on any religion - show me a Holy Book that meets this standard:
If a Holy Book is truly the work of a Supreme Mind, then it ought to exhibit not merely piety, but intellectual majesty. It should surpass the finest productions of human genius in clarity, moral insight, and grandeur of conception. One would expect, upon every page, some unmistakable evidence of a mind immeasurably higher than our own.
In such a book, justice would be defined with precision, liberty with dignity, duty with moral seriousness, and compassion with a depth that exceeds the best of human thought. Its wisdom would not be obscure for obscurity’s sake, nor would it bury truth beneath needless length, repetition, or contradiction. If a revelation must be wrestled from prolixity, ambiguity, and editorial confusion, one is entitled to ask whether the fault lies in the reader—or in the text itself.
A divine author, if such there be, would hardly be expected to scatter error among insight, or to mingle nobility with what later ages must name cruelty, superstition, or moral absurdity. And it will not do, once such defects are observed, to retreat behind the claim that the work is “not meant to be read literally.” For if a text contains even one word misplaced, one instruction unworthy of goodness, or one passage incompatible with reason, then its claim to perfect inspiration has already been diminished.
The question, then, is not whether the reader must strain to fit the book. The question is whether a truly supreme intelligence would produce a holy book so opaque, so lengthy, and so uneven that it requires perpetual apology from its defenders. A revelation worthy of the name would illuminate the mind, not exhaust it.
====And, if you agree, shouldn’t we ask “Why must we have religion at all?”===
The religious leaders (aka Explainers) really have to do some serious singing/dancing to justify all the IMMORALITY in their books...often claiming "well the world was so-and-so back in the those days." My follow-up for all the post BC/AD times "Well, we now know, for certain, that Sapiens has been on the planet more than 200,000 years, so why did your god wait more than 198,000 to send a savior/prophet/whatever to enlighten y'all?"
A clear sign that I have too much time on my hands: I decided I would work with AI to create
MY OWN HOLY BOOKS.
Yes, crazy. For me, necessary. Click links for more.
Why you ask? Yes, everyone asks why!