Selective Bible Belief

One of the worst parts about discussing theism with theists is the picking and choosing. Any time I point out a scripture that proves their ideas wrong, they argue that its the Old Testament so it doesn’t count, or that it is just a metaphor, and not literal.

Here’s my logic. According to the story, Jesus fulfilled the prophecies… mentioned in the Old Testament. If the Old Testament is just a metaphor, then so are the prophecies. Further, if Adam and Eve weren’t literal (as science has proven), then there was no original sin. If there was no original sin, there was no need for a redeemer. If there is no need for a redeemer, there was no need for Jesus to die.

Side rant: Not to mention that God invented the idea of sin, and he let the devil tempt and eventually lead Eve to eat the not-at-all-ironically named “fruit of KNOWLEDGE”, thus ensuring man’s fall. At no point did god intervene. Then thousands of years later, he decides that he DOES want to intervene after all. As an all powerful god, he could have simply said “ok, you puny humans are forgiven.” Instead, he opts for “I should kill my son. But it will just kill his body, so it’s not that big of a deal”.

If you say that Jesus “fulfilled the law”, then why do you still use the Ten Commandments, hate gays, and (some, though not all) think that women should follow the man as the head of the household? The argument I’ve heard quite a bit was that Jesus fulfilled the law, thus making the Old Testament complete, and thus irrelevant. But they still follow the Ten Commandments. They still use the OT to justify bigotry. They just skip the parts they don’t like. Those are “metaphors”. The parts they do follow, those are literal. The bad parts – the parts that make their religion look like pure evil – those are just metaphors.

God hates gays? Literal. God says to stone your children when they misbehave? Old Testament so it doesn’t count. Noah’s Ark? Metaphor or literal depending on your level of crazy. Oh. God’s Word just happens to match what you already believe? SHOCKING. How perfectly convenient. And the others? The other people who follow a different interpretation of god’s infallible word from the same book of spells? They’ll go to hell. What an almighty and just deity.

If the bible is the “word of god”, then why does it change? How is it open to interpretation? Why are their so many versions of Christianity? Most importantly, who are you to decide which parts of god’s word are literal and which are metaphorical? Shouldn’t it all be “the word of god” and that’s that? It’s not “the story of god”, it’s his infallible word.

Here’s the problem. If you think the bible is all metaphor, fine. It’s a book with characters and you can follow it’s moral precepts, though that is a dumb idea. Or you can believe the bible is all literal. Again, that’s a stupid and so obviously wrong idea, but it is logical. But it can’t be both. Either it’s all man made, or it’s not. To say that some parts are literal and some parts aren’t means that YOU get to decide what an all powerful god intended. It’s picking and choosing the good parts, while ignoring the bad parts. It’s intellectually dishonest. And it’s a huge cop out.

See, back in the day, you either believed in the literal bible, or you were a heretic and were killed. Black and white. Then science came and proved that most of the bible is either a flat out lie or at least improbable. Believers didn’t want to give up their fairy tale, so they started looking for loopholes. Enter: metaphors. But the people still believed that the New Testament was the sequel to the Old Testament. If they just said they started a new religion, they’d be ridiculed, like Scientology. But if they said they were an offshoot of Judaism, it lended credibility. It’s the exact same thing Mormons do with Christianity. Or many Christian sects did with Catholicism. It’s “based on’ or a “continuation” of the previous set of beliefs. Plus, you can take believers of the previous religion, and convert them to your new religion and you’re already half way there because they already buy into most of the nonsense.

“Well Jesus’ message was one of love.” I recently got into a debate on twitter about this. Let’s assume that Jesus existed (no proof). Let’s agree that his message was love. Fine. Do you need a god to tell you that? Shouldn’t that be fucking obvious. Unless you’re a sociopath, you should have an innate love for other humans. That’s why we don’t see average people stabbing other people. It’s just the insane ones who do. And to be fair, if that’s all Christians believed, I’d be fine with it. It’s the rest of it. It’s all the hatred that is spouted in Jesus’ name.

Let’s further agree that this love is extended to all people, not just believers. What about the gays? While Jesus NEVER SAID ANYTHING ABOUT HOMOSEXUALITY, most Christians are against it. Why? It’s the Old Testament, so it doesn’t count right? It’s in the same section where god said to stone misbehaving children and not to mix cloth. So why is homosexuality bad? What if you had a person who believed in Jesus, followed his teachings, was nice to everyone he met, gave away all of his possessions and helped the poor, but he also liked teh buttsecs. Does he deserve to spend eternity in hell? Of course not. Quite simply, because YOU think it is a sin, YOU chose to interpret god’s words as literal to justify your bigotry.

Would any of you have slaves? Of course not. It’s immoral. God was all for it, provided you treated them a certain way. And you could even kill them, as long as they didn’t die right away. God’s words. Not mine.

It’s all made up. How anyone can read the bible and see it as true is insane to me. Absolutely insane. To say that the bible is a “good source of morals” is a travesty. The god in the bible is malicious, capricious, offers the strictest punishment for the lowest of crimes, has no problem with rape or slavery or killing your own children. All he cares about is those who believe in him. Remember, when god said “love your neighbors” he meant “love other Jews”. It wasn’t until Jesus supposedly arrived when gentiles were permitted into heaven. These are the ideas tribal men invented to pacify opposition and remain in control.

Every single one of you is literally more moral than the metaphor that is the god of the bible.