Saturday, May 14, 2011

Show Me The Criteria!!!

I wrote this Letter to the Editor for the Cairo Messenger.
I would like to congratulate Bob Maige!!! I don’t think there could be any better proof for Dewitt Sheffield’s argument than Bob Maige’s letter to the editor. Why are people afraid of questions being asked about the Bible? Are they afraid of the answers? If anything I don’t think Dewitt goes far enough, I feel we should question everything in the Bible.
There are at present 38000 recognized denominations of the Christian religion, every one of them with their own interpretation of the Bible. And every one of those 38000 think they are the repository of the inerrant word of God. I have a suspicion that very few of them would entertain questions about their beliefs. Luckily good Christians can’t burn questioners at the stake anymore!
I do have a question for Dewitt. What is his criteria for a story? If the Garden of Eden is a story why isn’t the Virgin Birth a story? Is the criteria scientific evidence or is the criteria if something appears to be too magical and fanciful then it must be a story. There are six bible verses that mention unicorns. I’m fairly sure unicorns have never existed and are just fairy tales.
For Bob I don’t have any questions just some observations. In his letter Bob stated in a roundabout way that “modern knowledge” brought us many follies and errors. He uses two examples, the earth at the center of the universe and the flat earth. He seems to say that man’s knowledge was at fault. However I would like to point out the early church interpreted the Bible to say that the earth was the center of the universe and the earth was flat.

It was not until Galileo questioned the Christian Church with scientific evidence that we had a better understanding of our place in the universe. It wasn’t until the year 2000 that the Catholic Church apologized for its mistreatment of Galileo. The Church was behind the theory of the flat earth. Using many Bible verses that have the phrase “the four corners of the earth” and “unto the ends of the earth” the Church said the earth was flat. It wasn’t until Magellan questioned and his ships circumnavigated the world that man knew the earth was not flat.

We have to keep questioning everything. Especially religion, all religions. We should emulate Dorothy in the Wizard of OZ. Let’s keep pulling the curtain aside and looking behind everything. Soon we’ll find there is no Great Wizard. Just us.

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