Religion

There’s a bit of discussion going around concerning the ontological status of Adam and Eve — is the story literally true, useful metaphor, not really true but based somehow in reality, or what? For me, it would be hard to think of a less interesting question. But I do have a serious issue with the A&E story, which I rarely see discussed: it’s a terrible lesson on which to found a system of belief.

The story is told in Genesis, chapter two and chapter three. God sets up Adam in the Garden of Eden, and soon takes one of his ribs and makes Eve. For the most part the Garden is a pleasant place, and there doesn’t seem to have been any duties more onerous than coming up with names for the different animals. But for reasons that are not explained, God placed in the Garden something called the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and commanded that Adam and Eve not eat from it. (Translational difficulties being what they are, there is a school of thought that argues that “good and evil” should be understood as simply meaning “all things, both good and evil.”) Eventually, of course, they take a bite, with a little urging from a crafty serpent. God gets angry, curses them, and casts them out of the Garden forever — the Fall of Man, as Christians would have it.

The choice given to Adam and Eve was a simple one: (1) obey, or (2) attain knowledge, in particular of good and evil. If those are my two choices, I’m choosing “knowledge” every day. Count me on Team Eve on this one. As far as I’m concerned, this wasn’t the Original Sin, it was the Original Heroic Act.

I want to see a religion founded on exhortations to disobey authority and seek the truth at any cost.

Is Gandhi in hell? It’s a question that should puncture religious chauvinism and unsettle fundamentalists of every stripe. But there’s a question that should be asked in turn: Is Tony Soprano really in heaven?

A couple of rhetorical questions posed by Ross Douthat, who does us all the favor of reminding us how certain ideas that would otherwise be too ugly and despicable to be shared among polite society become perfectly respectable under the rubric of religion. (Via Steve Mirsky on the twitters.) In this case, the idea is: certain people are just bad, and the appropriate response is to subject them to torment for all time, without hope of reprieve. Now that’s the kind of morality I want my society to be based on.

The quote is extremely telling. Note that the first question is never actually answered — is Gandhi in hell? And there’s a good reason it’s never answered, because the answer would probably be “yes.” Hell is an imaginary place invented by people who think that eternal torture for people they disapprove of would be a good idea. And it’s the rare religion that says “we approve of all good people, whether or not they share our religious beliefs.” Much more commonly, Hell is brought up to scare people away from deviating from a particular religious path. Here’s the Catechism of the Catholic Church:

Jesus often speaks of “Gehenna” of “the unquenchable fire” reserved for those who to the end of their lives refuse to believe and be converted, where both soul and body can be lost. Jesus solemnly proclaims that he “will send his angels, and they will gather . . . all evil doers, and throw them into the furnace of fire”, and that he will pronounce the condemnation: “Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire!”

Do you think that, at the end of his life, Gandhi decided to believe in Jesus and converted?

The second question is equally telling, because even Douthat can’t bring himself to use a non-fictional person as an example of someone who deserves Hell. He’s trying to make the point that “we are defined by the decisions we make,” and if there is no way to make bad decisions then making good decisions is devalued. Which is a fine point to make, and many atheists would be happy to agree. The difference is that we don’t think that people who make bad decisions deserve to be tortured for all of eternity.

This enthusiastic stumping for the reality of Hell betrays not only a shriveled sense of human decency and a repulsive interest in pain inflicted on others, but a deplorable lack of imagination. People have a hard time taking eternity seriously. I don’t know of any theological descriptions of Hell that involve some version of parole hearings at regular intervals. The usual assumption is that it’s an eternal sentence. For all the pious musings about the centrality of human choice, few of Hell’s advocates allow for some version of that choice to persist after death. Seventy years or so on Earth, with unclear instructions and bad advice; infinity years in Hell for making the wrong decisions.

Hell isn’t an essential ingredient in humanity’s freedom of agency; it’s a horrible of invention by despicable people who can’t rise above their own petty bloody-mindedness. The thought of condemning millions of people to an eternity of torment makes Ross Douthat feel good about himself and gives him a chance to indulge in some saucy contrarianism. I tend to take issue with religion on the grounds that it’s factually wrong, not morally reprehensible; but if you want evidence for the latter, here you go.

William Lane Craig is a philosopher and theologian, most famous for advocating the Kalam cosmological argument for the existence of God. As far as I can tell, he is fairly well-respected in the theology community; I cited him among other people in my recent paper. He’s also a frequent participants in debates against atheists. These are slightly weird events; everyone says they’re a terrible idea, but everyone seems to willingly participate in them. Personally I think they can be a very useful forum, if done well.

Craig recently debated Lawrence Krauss in an event that got a lot of publicity. You can read Craig’s post-mortem reflections here; in response, Krauss has offered his own thoughts on how things went down, which are posted at Pharyngula. You can watch the whole thing on YouTube, but be warned it’s a long multi-part extravaganza.

As to who won, it’s a mixed bag. Craig is a very polished debater, and has his pitch honed to a fine sheen; every sentence makes a succinct point. On the other hand, many of his sentences are simply false. For example, he argues that the universe can’t be eternal, because infinity is an self-contradictory notion, because “infinity minus infinity” has no correct answer. This is not an unfair paraphrase.

In response, Lawrence was game, but much more impressionistic, with a style more appropriate to a public talk than to a formal debate. It depends on what you’re looking for, of course; he did have the advantage of being right. Craig is sufficiently good at debating that atheists are now advising each other to stay away from him for fear of looking bad — e.g. here and here. I sympathize with the general message — don’t get into something like this unless you know what’s coming and are truly prepared — but not with the final impression, that atheists should just steer clear. We should be good at presenting our arguments, and ready to do so. Craig is wrong about many things, but he’s not an out-and-out crackpot like Hugh Ross or Ken Ham. A good debate could be very interesting and helpful to thoughtful people who haven’t yet made up their minds. Being correct is already a huge advantage; we should be able to make our side clear using the force of reason, like we’re always telling people we do.