Where Did Christian Ideas Come From



For reasons no one has been able to discern, fervent Christians treat much of the Bible as a set of historical facts, not as a set of ideas that go back to a time before the faith. Efforts to track the sources of these ideas back in time is far more interesting than the ideas themselves.

It is interesting as well to wonder why some find the faith based on historical fact, contrary to evidence, while others find it merely a collection of ideas. A new scholarly box has just been published which concludes, so I have read, there is, and always has been, an emotional reason not to believe any tenets of any religion just as there has been an emotional reason to believe them. I will review this book in coming weeks.

As to the world of ideas, author Susan Jacoby recalled her days at Lutheran Augustana College where she learned the beautiful phrase, "I was blind, but now I see." Later she came to see a coded message, "You are blind, and now you must see what I see."

Years later, she was invited back to Augustana for a talk about her book, Freethinkers: A History of American Secularism, which I have discussed here. She reviewed life in the U.S. during the late 1700's and early 1800's and found open secularism much more common during the period than it has been since then.

After her talk, an intense 18 year old student came up to talk to her. He said he was drawn to the intellectual material she had presented about allowing everyone the think and practice their freedom of thought without imposing such thoughts on others. He was troubled, however. "But I know that I am in possession of the truth , and I don't know how to reconcile that with not doing everything I can to spread the truth to others, even if you might call this an intrusion on your freedom."

These ideas about "truth" were passed down to this young man from centuries ago. They worked for the ruling classes back then and today ideas about a god, devil, heaven, hell, anti abortion and anti gay serve well current politicians.

Fortunately, there have always been and are today skeptics about these "truths" and there are limits in this country to imposing them on everyone.


Comments

  1. tsmJanuary 5, 2020 at 3:56 PM


































    as far as I know much of the Scripture is based on historical fact. It is, in fact, the story of the Jewish people, embellished perhaps, but still a quite credible history filled with historical names and places. Other portions, like Sirach and Proverbs are mostly collections of wise sayings. Still others like Job appear to be religious dramas that wrestle with theological/philosophical questions of import at the time. (the Job character may have existed but even if he didn't who cares?) Some claim that the Moses account is derived from a similar story about Sargon, a great king of Sumer. This explanation, at least in my mind, seems questionable, inasmuch as the Genesis story seems to filled with factual detail to the extent that suggests that it should not be dismissed as a mere copycat yarn (as Jon would have it). We also know (or think we know) that Zoroastrianism may have influenced Jewish religious notions (and in turn Christianity). However true that may be, it does not deny the facticity of Scripture. all of which leaves us with an obvious conclusion, namely that much, but not all, of Scripture is, indeed, factual, literally true. .

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. tsmJanuary 5, 2020 at 4:58 PM

      truth in packaging: I am not, in any sense, a Scripture scholar. I approach these issues from the perspective of secular history.

      Delete

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