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An interesting question I think. I know there are a lot of members here who have said a lot is symbolic or allegory (Yeraz comes to mind)...
The article is written as a response to this question which was asked by another. It's linked in the first paragraph. This is the perspective of someone who couldn't reconcile belief with the untruths in the Bible (intentional allegory or not).
What are your thoughts? Christians, are there parts that aren't historical? If so, how do you reconcile this? Non-believers, did this play a role in why you do not believe? What untruth was it, if any, that you just couldn't reconcile?
Link to article
The article is written as a response to this question which was asked by another. It's linked in the first paragraph. This is the perspective of someone who couldn't reconcile belief with the untruths in the Bible (intentional allegory or not).
What are your thoughts? Christians, are there parts that aren't historical? If so, how do you reconcile this? Non-believers, did this play a role in why you do not believe? What untruth was it, if any, that you just couldn't reconcile?
How much of the Bible must be historical to believe in Christianity?
William Hamby
, Atlanta Examiner
October 6, 2011
On September 30, blogger Brian LePorte asked the question: "What events recorded in Scripture must be historical for you to affirm the truthfulness of Christianity?" (LINK) I thought it would be worth responding to this question from the other side: What level of a-historicity was enough to convince me that Christianity was wrong?
As a disclaimer, I need to make it clear that leaving Christianity did not make me an atheist. In fact, I went through several more phases of "spirituality," exploring other religions, science, and philosophy for several years before I rejected all religion. So, this is not an "argument for atheism." It is an argument against Christianity.
I was raised in a Biblical Literalist environment. The preachers told me that the word of God was inerrant, and that everything was literally true. Once I became sentient, it didn't take long to reject that claim. Between my step-father's infatuation with American Indian artifacts older than the earth itself, and my growing knowledge of geology, physics, and World History, it became clear that the Bible was far from a perfect document. My first rejection of Christianity was the rejection of literal Christianity.
I was raised in a Biblical Literalist environment. The preachers told me that the word of God was inerrant, and that everything was literally true. Once I became sentient, it didn't take long to reject that claim. Between my step-father's infatuation with American Indian artifacts older than the earth itself, and my growing knowledge of geology, physics, and World History, it became clear that the Bible was far from a perfect document. My first rejection of Christianity was the rejection of literal Christianity.
As my education progressed, and I discovered more and more inconsistencies with the Bible, I began to doubt even the metaphorical significance of some of the stories. It was particularly shocking for me to discover that there was likely no Moses, and in fact, no Egyptian captivity, and certainly no Exodus. To me, the Exodus had represented the first massive and powerful demonstration by Yahweh that the Israelites were the chosen people. This line of thought also raised significant questions about the historicity of Abraham, the father of what would become my religion. Once that dike had been breached, it wasn't long before I started wondering about Adam and Eve.
Of course, science has completely debunked the idea of Adam and Eve. My first course in evolutionary biology confirmed that. This discovery was the first giant chunk taken out of my faith in Christianity. Quite simply, if there was no "first couple," whence comes original sin? If there was no original sin, why did Jesus die? (If there was no original sin, did Jesus die?!)
As you can see, the question of original sin leads directly to the question of Jesus' historicity, which has recently come to be doubted more and more by scholars at all levels. (LINK) (LINK) Today, I consider myself an agnostic on the subject of Jesus' historicity. That is, I do not know if there was a real person named Jesus (or something similar) on whom the Gospel was based. (Matthew, Luke, and John are derivatives of Mark.) I also do not know if there is enough evidence to answer the question one way or another, or ever will be.
This last observation was the turning point for me. It was one thing to accept the Fathers of Israel as a-historical. It wasn't so difficult to accept that the line of Biblical Kings was also inaccurate to say the least. Doubting Genesis caused some problems. Doubting Jesus himself? That was the stake through the heart for Christianity.
Many Christians have given me the third degree over this rationality, so let me explain a little further. Please recognize that it was not solely the doubting of Jesus' historicity that led me away from Christianity. Had the rest of the Bible proved highly reliable, it would have been much easier for me to trust it with regard to Jesus, despite the paucity of empirical evidence for his existence. But when the rest of the Bible proved to be primarily legend, myth, and outright fabrication, it became impossible for me to take it as prima facie evidence for Jesus. I was forced to ask myself the painful question: If the Bible is inaccurate about damn near everything else it presented as historical, what possible justification can I come up with for believing the most important claim it makes?
The answer, of course, is this: In order to believe it, there needs to be some corroborating evidence that is staggeringly compelling. Such a momentous existence as that of the Lord and Savior of the Universe needs to be confirmed by more than rumors and decades-later sectarian chatter. Yet, this is all we see when we peer through the time portal. Paul saw a vision on a road. The anonymous author of the Gospel wrote a mythological story decades after the fact. Other anonymous authors copied it and sexed it up, Hollywood style. A couple of historians made brief passing mentions of people who might be Jesus.
In short, I came to distrust and ultimately disbelieve in any God who wasn't capable of at least leaving a couple of scraps in the ground to confirm his existence to scientists.
This, then, is the story of how I left Christianity. Of course it was more complicated and involved than this account, but these are the major points that caused sea changes in my thoughts and beliefs. Ultimately, it was not just reading the entire Bible that convinced me it was a scam. It was comparing that reading against the historical and scientific evidence, and discovering that it was far from an accurate source for... well... anything at all.
William Hamby, Atlanta Examiner
October 6, 2011
On September 30, blogger Brian LePorte asked the question: "What events recorded in Scripture must be historical for you to affirm the truthfulness of Christianity?" (LINK) I thought it would be worth responding to this question from the other side: What level of a-historicity was enough to convince me that Christianity was wrong?
As a disclaimer, I need to make it clear that leaving Christianity did not make me an atheist. In fact, I went through several more phases of "spirituality," exploring other religions, science, and philosophy for several years before I rejected all religion. So, this is not an "argument for atheism." It is an argument against Christianity.
I was raised in a Biblical Literalist environment. The preachers told me that the word of God was inerrant, and that everything was literally true. Once I became sentient, it didn't take long to reject that claim. Between my step-father's infatuation with American Indian artifacts older than the earth itself, and my growing knowledge of geology, physics, and World History, it became clear that the Bible was far from a perfect document. My first rejection of Christianity was the rejection of literal Christianity.
I was raised in a Biblical Literalist environment. The preachers told me that the word of God was inerrant, and that everything was literally true. Once I became sentient, it didn't take long to reject that claim. Between my step-father's infatuation with American Indian artifacts older than the earth itself, and my growing knowledge of geology, physics, and World History, it became clear that the Bible was far from a perfect document. My first rejection of Christianity was the rejection of literal Christianity.
As my education progressed, and I discovered more and more inconsistencies with the Bible, I began to doubt even the metaphorical significance of some of the stories. It was particularly shocking for me to discover that there was likely no Moses, and in fact, no Egyptian captivity, and certainly no Exodus. To me, the Exodus had represented the first massive and powerful demonstration by Yahweh that the Israelites were the chosen people. This line of thought also raised significant questions about the historicity of Abraham, the father of what would become my religion. Once that dike had been breached, it wasn't long before I started wondering about Adam and Eve.
Of course, science has completely debunked the idea of Adam and Eve. My first course in evolutionary biology confirmed that. This discovery was the first giant chunk taken out of my faith in Christianity. Quite simply, if there was no "first couple," whence comes original sin? If there was no original sin, why did Jesus die? (If there was no original sin, did Jesus die?!)
As you can see, the question of original sin leads directly to the question of Jesus' historicity, which has recently come to be doubted more and more by scholars at all levels. (LINK) (LINK) Today, I consider myself an agnostic on the subject of Jesus' historicity. That is, I do not know if there was a real person named Jesus (or something similar) on whom the Gospel was based. (Matthew, Luke, and John are derivatives of Mark.) I also do not know if there is enough evidence to answer the question one way or another, or ever will be.
This last observation was the turning point for me. It was one thing to accept the Fathers of Israel as a-historical. It wasn't so difficult to accept that the line of Biblical Kings was also inaccurate to say the least. Doubting Genesis caused some problems. Doubting Jesus himself? That was the stake through the heart for Christianity.
Many Christians have given me the third degree over this rationality, so let me explain a little further. Please recognize that it was not solely the doubting of Jesus' historicity that led me away from Christianity. Had the rest of the Bible proved highly reliable, it would have been much easier for me to trust it with regard to Jesus, despite the paucity of empirical evidence for his existence. But when the rest of the Bible proved to be primarily legend, myth, and outright fabrication, it became impossible for me to take it as prima facie evidence for Jesus. I was forced to ask myself the painful question: If the Bible is inaccurate about damn near everything else it presented as historical, what possible justification can I come up with for believing the most important claim it makes?
The answer, of course, is this: In order to believe it, there needs to be some corroborating evidence that is staggeringly compelling. Such a momentous existence as that of the Lord and Savior of the Universe needs to be confirmed by more than rumors and decades-later sectarian chatter. Yet, this is all we see when we peer through the time portal. Paul saw a vision on a road. The anonymous author of the Gospel wrote a mythological story decades after the fact. Other anonymous authors copied it and sexed it up, Hollywood style. A couple of historians made brief passing mentions of people who might be Jesus.
In short, I came to distrust and ultimately disbelieve in any God who wasn't capable of at least leaving a couple of scraps in the ground to confirm his existence to scientists.
This, then, is the story of how I left Christianity. Of course it was more complicated and involved than this account, but these are the major points that caused sea changes in my thoughts and beliefs. Ultimately, it was not just reading the entire Bible that convinced me it was a scam. It was comparing that reading against the historical and scientific evidence, and discovering that it was far from an accurate source for... well... anything at all.
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