Month: September 2008

Today, we’re going to look at Harris’s Chapter on morality. Now some of you might be surprised to hear that there are many things in this chapter that I agree with. However, I don’t think he has a foundation for the things he says that I agree with. This will be explained further though as we get into the chapter so put it on the backburner.

Harris does admit that once we abandon belief in a rule-making God, the question of why becomes open to debate. I note though that it seems he has snuck in a voluntarist interpretation of morality where X is moral because God decides it’s moral. If God had decided rape was moral, then rape would have been moral. If someone wishes to defend that view, let them. I find that it seems to make God a temporal being though.

For Harris though, right and wrong are questions about the happiness and suffering of sentient creatures, as he himself says. One wonders though if he has defined happiness. Mortimer Adler has noted that one of the mistakes of our time is saying that happiness is the same as “having a good time” whereas for the ancients, it was a life of moral virtue. For now though, let it be noted that he has a utilitarian ethic.

Harris rightly notes also that though people of different times and cultures disagree on morality, we should not be troubled. It says nothing about the status of moral truth. I agree and in fact, disagree that there is this huge divergence in morality. There are arguments that there are basic principles that all people in all times in all places seem to agree on even if the acting out of those principles is different.

Harris also gets into the problem of evil with saying “No perfect God could maintain such incongruities” when he speaks about various “evils” he sees in the world. The problem is though, “How does he know this?” How does he know that a good God is not allowing a certain amount of evil in the world because that is the way to bring about a certain good that wouldn’t be there otherwise?

Harris also says he wonders about those who believe in such a deity and see the end result as Hitler, Stalin, and the H-bomb. To quote him on page 173, “This is a devastating observation and there is no retort to it.” To say it is devastating is one thing. It might be a difficult observation even, but the ridiculous part is to say there is no retort. Here, I think Harris is being dishonest. Even if he doesn’t think the retorts work, he should at least speak of some theodicies. While he does use the term in his book, don’t expect him to actually deal with any of them. My answer is that Harris has not seen the end result. I believe it will be far better on the good scale than what he’s mentioned is on the evil scale.

Harris also says most of our religions haven’t been supportive of moral inquiry just as they haven’t been of scientific inquiry. First off, I as a Christian do want scientific inquiry. I want to see how this world is that God created. Second though, has he never read anything by a Christian on the topic of Christian ethics? This is definitely welcomed in Christian circles and we are constantly debating moral issues. Recently, for instance, someone sent me a message asking about lust. It’s an ethical question and one especially for young Christian men.

Harris also rightly says that we need to be sure what we mean by human beings. He admits that he does not have an answer, which I respect. What will be the criteria for humanness? On the secular viewpoint, I think it would be interesting to see if there could be an underlying human nature shared by all humans to make us all equal in some sense.

Harris also rightly condemns moral relativism saying on on 178 “But most forms of relativism–including moral relativism which seems especially well subscribed–are nonsensical. And dangerously so.” For this, I have to agree. My qualm though is I don’t think on a secularist viewpoint Harris can escape moral relativism.

I also agree with Harris on intuition, which he says seems to play a part in morality. If you had to ask me “Well why is murder evil?” I think I could give an answer. However, if you were thinking “I’m still not sure I’m sold,” well first off, I’d be wanting to get away from you as fast as possible. Second, I’d send some foolhardy messenger to tell you to get counseling now.

I also agree with his stance on pacifism. I am no fan of war and would prefer it wasn’t there, but I believe it is a sad reality and I think there are times that Christians can legitimately take up arms be they in individual battles, such as saving the life of one on the street, or in a war, such as stopping an evil nation in its plans with weaker ones.

I also applaud Harris’s story that he tells in here of how he saved a girl once. Ultimately, there is really a lot of good in this chapter on ethical theory. The problem is that it’s good with no basis. Consider again utilitarianism. Utilitarianism says that it seeks to bring about the greatest good for the most people. In a sense, that should be our goal. However, the question arises “What is good?” It isn’t always pleasure. Consider this example.

Let’s suppose the organization in question is a frat house and there is a beautiful lady in their midst. The guys there could consider their greatest good sexual pleasure and then believe that they should all sleep with the lady as much as they want. Thus, this lady is repeatedly raped by these guys resulting in their pleasure at the cost of her dignity.

We then have to ask “Is this pleasure really the highest good?” No. Even though it makes the most people happy, it isn’t really happiness and I hope none of us would call it good. Even in a utilitarian ethic, you still have to have some idea of good beyond the ethic and there’s even the problem of “You ought to do what brings about the most good for the greatest number of people.” Why? Why not do just what brings about good for me? “Well that isn’t good for the greatest number of people.” Why should I care about them?

In closing, I like a lot of what Harris says in this chapter. I will say when Harris isn’t throwing out straw men and showing his ignorance in areas of religion, there is good that can be gained from many of the things he says. However, I see no ethical theory in his work that has any grounding and I do see a strong one in Christian theism, giving me more reason to believe that it’s true. Physicalism just can’t explain my intuitions. Good and evil are not physical qualities after all. If Harris wants to try to find them in science, good luck. I believe his effort will be in vain though.

In this chapter, Harris looks at civilization today in light of religion. His opinions though still assume a sort of fundamentalist style of Christianity. For instance, he seems to think all Christians are pre-trib, dispensational. Whether I or anyone else is, that is irrelevant. What is relevant is that anyone in the know in Christian thought at least knows there are other ideas out there.

Harris quotes Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia on morality and how he believes that the nation of America is a nation of religious people. The nation’s moral authority is rooted in the Christian ethic. Harris seems to think that this should be terrifying to those who think reason should prevail in the West, which is still his straw man that reason is automatically opposed to faith. (Christian philosophers are becoming more and more numerous.)

Funny though. The Founding Fathers weren’t terrified at that….

Harris thinks we should be drawing on sources that show a greater understanding of the human mind and modern society than saint Paul. Question here though. Why modern? What makes our time the main authority? Could it be that maybe we should go and dust off the old philosophical and theological works of the past and see if maybe the cure for what ails us has been buried by us?

Harris also speaks of the barbarous author of Leviticus. We will deal with his moral standard later, but let us remember that this barbarous author is the one who gave us the command that we are to love our neighbors as ourselves.

Harris also speaks of the danger of drug use, to which I agree, and adds that people use drugs to get effects that mirror those of religion, which is why religious people supposedly want to ban drugs. Hmmmm. Sorry Mr. Harris, but I don’t know a drug that makes me grow to be more like Christ or seek to serve my fellow man more. Maybe you can tell me what it is.

Interestingly, on page 161, he says that it can’t be about health effects that we want them banned since cigarettes and alcohol are both allowable. However, on page 163, he notes that Prohibition came about because of an explicitly religious exercise of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union and the lobbying of Protestant Missionary societies?

And these within two pages of each other….

In speaking about abortion, he states that we are concerned about the fate of a single cell. Harris says whenever the president scratches his nose, cells are dying as well. This is an extreme straw man. It is only with cloning that such happens. The zygote naturally becomes another human being. One wonders at the thinking behind such an objection.

In the next chapter, Harris will finally address the question of morality. We’ll join him again then.

To begin with, let me address the comment from yesterday which I do appreciate. First off, the argument about the Hebrew in Isaiah 7:14 is quite complex in Reymond. I recommended it as the best resource. The word does mean young girl, but the context does show something rather miraculous about it. For a look at an online resource, I recommend going here to the Christian-Thinktank.

http://www.christian-thinktank.com/fabprof2.html

As for the question of a theocracy, I believe that is best saved for when the review is done and I hope my friend will send me a message to remind me to address that question.

Tonight though in Harris’s book, we’re going to be looking at Harris’s chapter on the problem of Islam. This is a chapter I agreed with much in. As a Christian, I do believe Islam is a threat. I also don’t believe that it has the evidence backing it that Christianity does. Nevertheless, as I write this, 9-11 is just around the corner and that is an example of what Islam can do and that is entirely within the tenets of Islam.

It will be noted that Harris says Muslims have learned to ignore most of their canon as most Christians have learned to do. The issue of life in the Ancient Near East in a theocracy will be dealt with later and that might be its own series as well. However, part of this I can understand. A lot of Christians do write off the Old Testament in almost a Marcionite way.

The Old Testament though is just as much God’s Word as the New Testament is. Now it was not written to us, but it was written FOR us. The same applies to Paul’s epistles. Too often, we go to the Bible and try to find personal messages for us in there. They’re not there. There are general messages for all believers, but not something personally for you. Every part of Scripture though has something we can learn from it.

Also, as he argues, Harris says in a hundred years, we will have some scientifically astute things to say about ethics. When we get to the chapter where morality is discussed, I plan to address this more, but I want to bring it out now so that my readers will know that I am aware of the statement and I do intend to not leave it unanswered.

I do think Harris says much in this chapter that is politically interesting and I doubt anyone Christian could read it and not think “Yes. There is some truth in here as to how much of a threat Islam is.” I do believe that we need to keep an eye on the Muslim world and I do think it would behoove us to learn about Islam. Not so we can practice tolerance as so many liberals in America seem to think, but so that we can know our opponents and what they believe.

A major criticism I have of this chapter though and it seems to ring true throughout the book. Aside from the Qu’ran, Harris cites NO Muslim sources I know of. In fact, the one time I see a Muslim saying something, it is cited in another source. From reading Harris’s book, you’d think Christians and Muslims both have no intellectual arguments. They do. Naturally, I think arguments in support of Islam specifically are flawed, though I do acknowledge good arguments for theism did come from Islam in the medieval period. The point is that even if they are flawed, Harris needs to realize they exist and even if he thinks they are flawed, which he obviously does, he needs to let his readers know he knows of them. He is not giving an honest picture of Islam or Christianity in that regards.

Of course, it is for the Muslims to defend themselves. I have no desire to do such. I urge the reader to check the bibliography though and try to find names like “Geisler, Craig, Habermas (There is one cited, but it is not Gary Habermas), Moreland, or Zacharias. They’re not there.

And for me, that is a HUGE problem.

We are currently reviewing Sam Harris’s book “The End of Faith.” Let it be noted again that I am only covering highlights here, used in the loosest sense of the word. We are also here not going to be covering the multiple times that he mentions beliefs without evidence as those have been addressed in the first post reviewing this book.

Harris does have some interesting information in this chapter. I found myself reading the theories on memory and belief with interest. I am for good philosophy no matter who does it. I am not saying that I necessarily think that Harris is right on everything yet, but I am saying he does raise up issues that I think need to be addressed by theists and non-theists alike.

Unfortunately, most of this chapter as we go through is the straw man. There is an illustration that needs to be addressed though. Starting on page 74, Harris presents three different stories and asks if we can believe the source of information.

#1-The anchorman on the evening news speaks of a fire in Colorado that has claimed 100,000 acres and is still spreading.

#2-The claim of scientists that DNA is the basis for sexual reproduction and the characteristics that we have is because of our DNA.

#3-The Pope says Jesus was born of a virgin and resurrected bodily after death, he’s the Son of God, created the universe in 6 days, and if you believe this, you go to Heaven when you die, and if not, you go to Hell to suffer for eternity.

Let’s look at these.

#1-I have little problem believing. It’s straight forward and could be verified especially in our day and age. I could check something like Google Maps and see if a fire is burning, for instance. Now let’s suppose something else was the statement.

What if it was a statement on politics for instance?

Many of us know we’d immediately be asking questions. Is the reporter’s opinion valid? Is the source of the information the reporter is receiving valid? All of a sudden, we’re not as sure. Some might think it’s more or less valid depending on if it’s Fox News or MSNBC. It might depend on if it’s the Washington Post or the New York Times.

#2-Most of us would not have much problem especially since this seems unanimous amongst scientists. Again though, we would be wary of statements that introduce their worldview. Most Americans today, for instance, don’t accept evolutionary theory on the naturalistic level. Some people get skeptical about new health advice that comes from scientists debating to themselves whether different diets truly work or not.

#3-I am a Protestant. I would not accept the Pope as an infallible authority. That does not mean I would not consider him an imperfect authority. Let’s suppose that we took Harris’s statement and took out “The Pope says” and put instead these words in the front.

“The Roman Catholic church believes that”

All of a sudden, I think Sam Harris even would say “True.” If an Imam stands up and says what Islam teaches, I’d be more prone to accept that. If a Seminary professor at a Calvinist seminary wants to tell me what Calvinists believes, I’d give it more validity.

I’ll also note that Harris probably intends to mean young-earth creationism with the statement of six days, which not all Christians accept.

Now why do I accept the statement about Christ being the Son of God or what the Bible says? Not because they say so simply. That’s blind faith. I say so because I do believe that there are valid reasons for believing such, but such reasons Mr. Harris has already decided in advance do not really exist. He has built up a straw man entirely.

In the next chapter, Harris looks at the history of Christianity. We shall look at his look tomorrow.

Well readers, I hope everything works well tonight. We’re experiencing technical difficulties at what I suppose you could call the home base of Deeper Waters. However, it is still our commitment to do the regular blog and that commitment is going to stay. We’re doing a review of Sam Harris’s “The End of Faith.” Last night, we looked at the straw man he has built up of no evidence for Christianity and his re-defining faith.

A reader made an astute observation also in stating that could it be Sam Harris’s re-definition could be in part the fault of the church and our continuing anti-intellectualism and emotional mindset that has made us ripe for postmodern thought. I thoroughly agree and this is something I plan to write on later. Church. The new atheists are out there and are a threat, but we can’t say that we haven’t left the doors of attack wide open in fleeing our intellectual ground.

Harris starts describing an Islamic suicide bomber taking out a bus in a city. Now I agree with Harris. This kind of faith is dangerous. I say this especially because I don’t see Islam having the same historical, philosophical, and theological backing that Christianity has. If someone wishes to challenge me on that point though, they are welcome to it.

Harris goes on to speak of how our beliefs do affect our behavior. I see no reason why anyone would disagree with him on this nor do I know how they can. His argument though will be that faith results in negative behavior in the long run and that it is such that it has no evidence. Friends, for the no evidence charge, you know that much has been written here at Deeper Waters about such a charge and I choose to leave it at that unless necessary and remind the reader that there are several helpful books on Christian apologetics and numerous websites which can be found by checking the links on the side. In fact, for help on the books, I recommend going to Tektonics and looking through their book section.

He speaks of how the great slaughters and massacres in history have started because of religion. It would have been nice to have some named. One can see that conveniently, events like the Gulag and the reign of leaders like Pol-Pot are being overlooked. To his credit, Harris does address those later on and when we get there, we will see what he says.

Harris also notes a problem of intolerance. It would have been preferable though for him to have defined tolerance. Does he mean that there is no idea of we respect your right to hold your belief even if we disagree? If that is the case, I believe most Christians would hold to that, and in fact, I think it’s quite biblical that they hold to it. If he means acceptance, then no. We do not accept them as equally true worldviews. Neither does Harris, and he shouldn’t.

Harris also presents an idea that religion is beyond rational discourse and cannot be criticized. One wonders that if this is the case, then how did Harris get his book published? Does he not watch the news either? You can say whatever you want to say about Christianity and it’s okay. Does Mr. Harris condemn the idea that you can’t say anything negative about homosexuality in some countries? What does he think about people having to go to sensitivity training classes because of their moral stance?

He also speaks of those who believe in the literal truth of Revelation, and in this case referring to the book. Mr. Harris is unaware that many orthodox Christians do not hold to a literal interpretation and indeed, in some areas, even the most dispensational believe out there will recognize that there is great symbolism in the book of Revelation. If one wants a fair representation of the Christian worldview though, he won’t get it from Harris.

Harris also speaks of alchemy in the Middle Ages. Yes. That has been discreditted. However, it should be noted that it found its roots in the doctrine of primary matter. That isn’t found in a statement of faith somewhere. Instead, it’s found in Aristotle. It is amusing that for the concept of bad ideas that have been discarded, Harris doesn’t bring up a religious one. (Maybe he’s just unfamiliar with religious history. One can certainly get that impression from his work.)

Harris does admit though that there are emotional and spiritual needs that faith does seem to fulfill. I find it interesting that a being could be entirely physical and have spiritual needs. Not just that, but the cosmos could consist of physical substances only and still there are spiritual needs. Is there any way Harris can fit this into his atheism? This is one reason even some atheists, I suspect, believe Harris to be more New Age than atheistic.

Harris decides to bring out then a passage from Deuteronomy. He has quoted 13:7-11, or at least what he calls 7-11. Instead, it’s actually 6-10a. One thinks if Harris was going to publish his thoughts in a book, he’d at least proofread and make sure he got the Scriptural references correct. If he will not do such, can we trust on other issues?

Harris speaks of how Christians ignore this passage. We don’t. What he forgets is that this was addressed to Israel as a theocracy and a nation that was ruled by him. There are no theocracies today in this sense. Israel was to be the kingdom of priests to the world until the coming of the great high priest, our Lord and Savior, Jesus, the Messiah.

Harris instead speaks of the greater ideas of the last two thousand years like Democratic politics, scientific advancement, human rights, and an end to cultural and geographical isolation. Is he not aware though of how many of these, particularly scientific advancement and human rights came about largely as an influence of Christian thought?

On page 41, Harris gives a most interesting argument in saying that the world you hear and see is nothing more than a modification of your consciousness, the physical status of which remains a mystery. Harris realizes there are philosophical problems, of which namely is “How does he know this?” He seems to think he’s getting accurate information about the external world all throughout this book. One is even more astounded that before this he says that no human being has ever experienced an objective world, or a world at all. If that is the case though, then why ask for evidence that is supposedly objective? Why isn’t that a construct of the mind as well?

Please note readers that many areas are being skipped. This is simply because they were discussed last time and the same straw men keep coming forth. I choose to focus on highlights. Tomorrow, we shall look at chapter 2 of Harris’s book.

Tonight, we’re going to start reviewing Sam Harris’s “The End of Faith.” Before going through the book, piece by piece, I’d like to go through overall first and notice something that I consistently see being said. For all those wanting to check up on what I say, I am reading from the First Edition that was copyrighted in 2004. I do urge you to check and make sure of what I say.

Let’s go through and see what is said on a theme consistently.

Page 15 has Harris talking about different religious worldviews and saying “It should go without saying that these rival belief systems are all equally uncontaminated by evidence.”

I will leave it to the Jews and Muslims to defend their own faiths, but as for me, this is far from the truth. If the body of Jesus is found, let me state this. I will give up my Christian faith immediately. I don’t want any wishy-washy idea of a spiritual resurrection where Jesus Christ simply lives in our hearts. That might be a touching story, but it won’t pay for my sins and give me life beyond the grave.

On page 17, he again speaks of religious belief and says “How is it that, in this one area of our lives, we have convinced ourselves that our beliefs about the world can float entirely free of reason and evidence?”

Yeah. That must explain why I’m a philosophy major who enjoys discussing how my faith is reasonable and how rational it is and I lean more on logic than I do on my emotions.

On page 19 we read: “Tell a devout Christian that his wife is cheating on him, or that frozen yogurt can make a man invisible, and he is likely to require as much evidence as anyone else, and to be persuaded only to the extent that you give it. Tell him that the book he keeps by his bed was written by an invisible deity who will punish him with fire for eternity if he fails to accept its every incredible claim about the universe, and he seems to require no evidence whatsoever.”

I’d like to know what Christians Harris is talking about. I have more of a problem with him than he does. However, is this the way Christianity has always been? No. The early Christian witness was to proclaim the empty tomb. Something that I’ll be sure to note again in this work. I don’t see any references to Christian thinkers in this work. If you read Harris alone, you’d think there aren’t any.

On the other hand, note on page 20 in speaking of religious texts he says “So it is not that these texts have maintained their integrity over time (they haven’t)….”

Unfortunately, while Harris says Christians don’t give evidence, he gives none for this claim. Not a single endnote.

On page 23 we read, “This has always posed a special problem for religion, because every religion preaches the truth of propositions for which it has no evidence. In fact, every religion preaches the truth of propositions for which no evidence is even conceivable. This put the ‘leap’ in Kierkegaard’s leap of faith.”

Now this is just a bizarre claim. Mr. Harris just needs to go to the apologetics section of the bookstore. Now he can say that the evidence is wrong. That’s a totally different claim. Even if a person’s reasons for thinking something are wrong, he still has reasons. Mr. Harris thinks evidence isn’t even conceivable. For what kind of claim is he speaking? I think we can conceive evidence that the universe came out of nothing, for instance.

On page 24, he speaks of untestable doctrines, but what does he mean by this? How would he have history be tested? You can’t do it the same way you do science or philosophy. Harris gives no explanation in this though. He merely asserts it.

On page 25 we read “In fact, almost every indignity just mentioned can be attributed to an insufficient taste for evidence, to an uncritical faith in one dogma or another. The idea, therefore, that religious faith is somehow a sacred human convention–distinguished, as it is, both by the extravagance of its claims and by the paucity of its evidence—is really too great a monstrosity to be appreciated in all its glory. Religious faith represents so uncompromising a misuse of the power of our minds that it forms a kind of perverse, cultural singularity—a vanishing point beyond which rational discourse becomes impossible. When foisted upon each generation anew, it renders us incapable of realizing just how much of our world has been unnecessarily ceded to a dark and barbarous past.”

Any evidence of this claim? Nope. It’s merely an assertion. It’s a completely false one as well. I enjoy rational discourse especially with those who disagree with my faith. I also make it a point to tell people they need a whole lot more than their testimony to share their faith with people.

The following two quotes come from page 29:

“We, too, cherish the idea that certain fantastic propositions can be believed without evidence.”

“The concessions we have made to religious faith, to the idea that belief can be sanctified by something other than evidence—have rendered us unable to name, much less address, one of the most pervasive causes of conflict in our world.”

Maybe it’s just me, but it seems to me that Mr. Harris can easily name what he says we are unable to name and he can easily address what he says we are unable to address, what he sees as one of the most pervasive causes of conflict in our world. Harris repeats this straw man so much throughout his book as if he can repeat it “without evidence”, it will eventually be true.

Page 31:

“If we would speak of the baseness of our natures, our willingness to live, kill, and die on account of propositions for which we have no evidence should be among the first topics of discussion.”

Fine. Let’s discuss Harris’s claims. He gives no evidence for them.

On page 35:

“How can any person presume to know that this is the way the universe works? Because it says so in our holy books. How do we know that our holy books are free from error? Because the books themselves say so.”

Mr. Harris. This is simply a straw man. You want to destroy this argument. Good. More power to you there. It’s disingenuous though to act as if this is all that ALL Christians say.

On page 39, he again speaks of “The paucity of evidence.”

On page 45, we have a lengthy quote:

“It is time we admitted, from kinds and presidents on down, that there is no evidence that any of our books was authored by the creator of the universe. The Bible, it seems certain, was the work of sand-strewn men and women thought the Earth was flat and for whom a wheelbarrow would have been a breathtaking example of emerging technology.  To rely on such a document as the basis of our worldview—however heroic the efforts of its redactors—is to repudiate two thousand years of civilizing insights that the human mind has only just begun to inscribe upon itself through secular politics and scientific culture. We will see that the greatest problem confronting civilization is not merely religious extremism: rather, it is the larger set of cultural and intellectual accomodations we have made to faith itself. Religious moderates are , in large part, responsible for the religious conflict in our world, because their beliefs provide the context in which scriptural literalism and religious violence can never be adequately opposed.”

A statement like this speaks for itself, but one criticism especially. A wheelbarrow emerging technology? These people lived in a time of pyramids and the hanging gardens. They saw chariots and events like a water system Hezekiah built. The Romans had indoor plumbing even. It seems that if anyone is making a claim without evidence, it’s Harris.

Later on page 45 continuing to the start of 46.

“Nothing that a Christian and a Muslim can say to each other will render their beliefs mutually vulnerable to discourse, because the very tenets of their faith have immunized them against the power of conversation. Believing strongly, without evidence, they have kicked themselves loose of the world. It is therefore in the very nature of faith to serve as an impediment to further inquiry.”

That’s right. Keep telling everyone the same nonsense and they’ll eventually believe it. Unfortunately, if anyone is familiar with Christian apologetics in any way, they are simply laughing. Harris is banking on his readers not doing any of their own research.

Two quotes from page 48:

“It is time we recognized that the only thing that permits human beings to collaborate with one another in a truly open-ended way is their willingness to have their beliefs modified by new facts. Only openness to evidence and argument will secure a common world for us. Nothing guarantees that reasonable people will agree about everything, of course, but the unreasonable are certain to be divided by their dogmas. This spirit of mutual inquiry is the very antithesis of faith.”

“We must find our way to a time when faith, without evidence, disgraces anyone who would claim it.”

Page 64:

“Faith enables many of us to endure life’s difficulties with an equanimity that would be scarcely conceivable in a world lit only by reason.”

On page 64, he gives a long definition and I suggest the reader go to Tektonics and read “What is Faith?” to see the contrast. Harris speaks of Hebrews 11:1

“Read in the right way, this passage seems to render faith entirely self-justifying: perhaps the very fact that one believes in something which has not yet come to pass (‘things hoped for.’) or for which one has no evidence (‘things not seen.’) constitutes evidence for its actuality. (‘assurance.’)”

He later says “Throughout this book, I am criticizing faith in its ordinary Scriptural sense—as belief in, and life orientation toward, certain historical and metaphysical propositions.”

Does he cite any lexicons? Nope. Does he cite any Bible dictionaries? Nope. Does he cite any commentaries? Not a one!

But then says on page 65:

“Of course, anyone is free to redefine the term “faith” however he sees fit and thereby bring it into conformity with some rational or mystical idea.”

Which is exactly what Harris has done with this straw man.

In fact, most of page 65 is worth quoting and I urge the reader to check it out.

Page 66:

“This is the very same faith that will not stoop to reason when it has no good reasons to believe.”

Page 67:

“But the fact that unjustified beliefs can have a consoling influence on the human mind is no argument in their favor.”

Two on 68:

“The serach for comfort at the expense of truth has never been a motive for religious belief, since all creeds are chock-full of terrible proposals which are no comfort to anyone and which the faithful believe, despite the pain it causes them, for fear of leaving some dark corner of reality unacknowledged.”

Yeah. The Nicene Creed keeps me up at night in pain.

“The faithful have never been indifferent to the truth; and yet, the principle of faith leaves them unequipped to distinguish truth from falsity in matters that most concern them.”

Odd. I have no problem recognizing the straw man from Harris.

Friends. If I keep repeating these sections, I’ll be here all night. I’ll only quote the ones I want to address. I will give references though to all that I see.

The end of page 71 through to the beginning of page 73 is another straw man of faith.

Page 76:

“What process of ratiocination, mystical or otherwise, will deliver the necssary facts about Galileans woman’s sexual history (facts that run entirely conunter to well-known facts of human biology?)

Yeah. You know why Joseph decided to divorce her in private? Because he knew these well-known facts. He knew what it takes to make a baby.

Seriously Harris, do tell us when it was discovered that it requires sexual intercourse to make a baby and how the ancients didn’t know this. Where’s your “evidence”?

The claim about beliefs without evidence enabling a man to be capable of anything is on page 85.

Page 105 speaks the same with a quote saying that religious doctrine and honest inquiry are rarely juxtaposed.

Page 106: insufficient evidence.

More can be found throughout page 165.

Page 176:

“Most of our religions have been no more supportive of genuine moral inquiry than of scientific inquiry generally.”

Later that same page:

“Credit goes to Christopher Hitchens for distilling, in a single phrase, a principle of discourse that could well arrest our slide toward the abyss: “What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence.”

Is any evidence given for the truth of Hitchen’s claim?

No?

Then we can dismiss it without evidence.

Don’t you love self-refuting statements?

I urge the reader to check the paragraphs ending page 221 starting with the topic of mysticism.

From the epilogue on Page 223:

“While religious faith is the one species of human ignorance that will not admit of even the possibility of correction, it is sheltered from criticism in every corner of our culture.”

I will say more about this in a later post, but at this point, I want to know, if it is sheltered from criticism in every corner, how the heck did he get this book published?

The second paragraph on 225 should be seen but notice this straw man:

“Where we have reasons for what we believe, we have no need of faith.”

Again, this is simply a straw man. Faith is not blind belief but belief in what has shown itself to be reliable. Trusting in reason is an act of faith as well because reason has shown itself to be reliable. It could be we are fooling ourselves and are brains in vats, but I doubt it.

Page 232:

“As I do my best to spell out over the course of the book, religious faith is the belief in historical and metaphysical propositions without sufficient evidence.”

Which he points out several times! Unfortunately, he does so without sufficient evidence.

Friends. I haven’t even quoted every section, but the case is clear. Before we go through this book, Harris is not arguing against intellectual Christianity. He is arguing against a straw man. We will further see how weak his assessment is as we go on.

We’ve spent recent time reviewing Eckhart Tolle’s book “A New Earth.” It has been found wanting and thus far, no one has been able to say otherwise on the comments. I say “Thus far” for tomorrow, someone might dare raise an objection. If they do, great. If I’m wrong, I’d like to see it, but I’m going to need more than an experience. I’m going to need a look at what I said and show where I went wrong.

Tonight, I plan to show where Eckhart Tolle went wrong as there is one gaping hole in his worldview.

Tolle has no revealed truth in his religion.

What Tolle has done is begun with man and he has ended with man. He is the source of his truth ultimately and he only uses sources like Christ and Buddha insofar as he thinks that they agree with him. Christ dying on the cross for the sins of the world does not fit into the worldview of Tolle, so it must be disregarded. 

What happened with him is that he had an experience. He used his experience as the absolute point of reference to interpret reality. Now we all have to do this to some extent. We all do have to interpret reality. However, what Tolle did was going to the “great spiritual teachers” and finding those statements that agreed with what he already thought. Instead, it would have been best to have gone to those teachers and seen their experience and see if his experience had led to a false interpretation.

Note this also: We cannot speak of an experience as true or false. For instnace, the Mormons that I have spoken about claim to have a burning in the bosom. It does no good for us to talk about a true experience. It is propositional information that is either true or false and that can come about through experiences. One can say “I had a burning in the bosom upon reading the BOM.” That can be a true statement and I don’t doubt many times that it is. That does not mean that the propositional content connected with that experience is necessarily true. It could be, but you won’t know by the experience itself.

How do you know what is true? You look at reality. Another example:

Last June, readers might remember that I had a sickness. I don’t know exactly what it was, but it struck me and made me incredibly cold. I was out in June remember and I was wearing a coat to go see the doctor because I was that cold. My roommate came home from class one day and I was in my clothes on the couch with a robe on and with two blankets on and I was shivering. 

It was only after I recovered that I learned our town was undergoing a massive heatwave at the time.

I had experienced the world around me as cold. Now you could not come to me and say “You are not experiencing that.” (That is, unless you believed I had some reason to be lying.) However, while I was experiencing the world around me as cold, was it cold? No. It was incredibly hot. There were other factors involved that were giving me a false picture, such as something within my body that was keeping me from interpreting reality properly, much like being color-blind doesn’t mean that that light in traffic isn’t really red.

Is what Tolle experienced giving him true content about reality? Apparently not. We have found numerous problems with his view as well as the fact that it could be demonstrated that he disagrees with the basic facts about Christianity. If someone wishes to ask me if my view is false, I say “Bring it.” I am more than ready to defend historical and orthodox Christianity.

What would I suggest to Tolle? Get past your experience. When I am evangelizing to someone, I do not point to experience except as a secondary. I point to the primary facts. Here is what reality is and I can show it. Jesus Christ is who he claimed to be. He died and rose again. He is Lord and he is God and he will judge the world. He is absolutely holy and no sin can be in his presence.

Tolle, of course, thinks he’s right. Well, he’d better be. Those who follow him better make sure he’s right also. Based on the analysis I have shown, Tolle is in direct opposition with historical orthodox Christianity.  You cannot hold to Tolle’s worldview and the worldview of Jesus Christ at the same time. Choose this day who you will serve. I have made my choice and I have a lot more to back it than an experience. Do you?

Oprah Winfrey has asked how can there possibly be one way to God? Is God more concerned about how our hearts are or if we call his son Jesus? What about jealousy? How can God be a jealous God? After all, Exodus 34:14 says his name is Jealous.

Let’s notice something first. The number of people on the planet has nothing to do with the number of possible ways to God. What if we changed some words?

“With 6 billion people on the planet, there can’t possibly be only oxygen that keeps us alive!”

“Are you going to tell the person who has never heard that murder is always wrong?”

“It is judgmental of you to think that we are all carbon-based lifeforms.”

Most of us would at least accept statements 1 and 3. If you don’t accept 2, please go get counseling. Why do we accept them? Because we know they’re truth claims. Truth claims are either true or false as I’ve said in the blog on Eckhart Tolle on truth. I urge the reader to go see that blog if they haven’t for I have no intention of repeating myself here.

This isn’t just Oprah’s idea though. While not using the same terminology, Eckhart Tolle seems to come from the same kind of pluralistic view point.

Let’s remember this to begin with. This is a truth claim. The claim can be understood and makes sense. Let’s take some presuppositions of Oprah’s in the claim of hers about 6 billion people and one way to God.

First off, it does not follow. How many ways must there be for each, say thousand people?  One way? At what point do two ways show up? What is the connection?

Second, is she presupposing also that God wants people to come to him? How does she know there isn’t some sick and sadistic god up there who is just toying with everyone?

Third, is she not presupposing truth doesn’t matter to this God but only conduct? How does she know this about him?

Let’s look though from a Christian view. Also, keep in mind that Christianity is NOT the only exclusive religion. Islam is exclusive. Judaism is exclusive. Hinduism is even exclusive and Buddhism was founded on the exclusion of Hinduism.

Can Christianity defend its claim though?

The Christian claim is not that you go to Hell for not believing in Jesus.

Some of you may be shocked by that.

The Bible makes it clear what you go to Hell for. Your works. They’re not good enough. God demands absolute perfection and if you don’t have perfection, then you’re not in. It’s the only fair way for God to judge you. Now Jesus is the way out of that judgment. When you accept Jesus, you get his works instead of your own and God judges you based on what he saw in Christ. If you don’t have Christ, then in Christian though, you must be absolutely perfect.

I don’t know about you, but it’s way too late for me on that one.

This is not God being fussy about a theology exam. Now someone might ask “Well that’s understandable, but Oprah does ask about those people who’ve never heard. What about them?”

Frankly, we don’t know for certain. We do know though that Revelation 7 tells us that a great crowd will be there from every people group out there and Christ tells us that many will come from the North, South, East, and West to the marriage supper of the lamb. Thus, whatever conclusion we reach, it will have to account for a large number of people.

What’s my stance? Romans 1 speaks of God’s existence being made clear from all that there is and some of his attributes are known. Romans 2 speaks of the moral law written on our hearts. We all know that some things are right and we all know that some things are wrong. My conclusion with that data then is that God judges people rightly on the light they have. However, considering they don’t have much really, I greatly push the Great Commission to get the gospel to as many people as possible. In the end though, I am confident no one will walk away from judgment day saying “It wasn’t fair” and I believe that if anyone out there is truly seeking, they will get that light somehow.

“But isn’t right conduct important?”

Of course it is. The problem is, it’s not good enough. What you do should flow out of what you believe. God’s standard is perfection. That’s not arbitrary either! What would be arbitrary is if God said “Each good act is worth X points and each bad one takes away X points and the value of X depends on the act. If you get to judgment with Y points, you win!”

For Christians, I do believe how we live on Earth will determine our rewards in Heaven. It won’t determine whether we get to Heaven or not. We live right though simply because of Christ. He died for us so we are to live for one another. That also includes taking that one way to everyone that we meet out there so they can know him as well.

“Okay. That’s sensible. What about God being jealous though?”

Good question.

First off, there is some jealousy that is good. Gentlemen. I want you to picture yourself newly married on a honeymoon with your bride. You are walking down the beach holding her hand and some guy comes up to you who you don’t know and says “Hey! Your girl is hot there! Do you mind if I take her with me for awhile and have some fun?”

Whatever you take “having some fun” to mean, and I think most of us know what most guys would have in mind, I would hope you would tell the guy to get lost. Why? Because this is your lady and you have a right to be jealous of her.

The Handbook of Biblical Social Values edited by Pilch and Malina says the following on page 210 under Zeal/Jealousy:

Zeal/Jealousy refers to the concern for maintaining possession and control over that to which one claims to have honorable and exclusive access.

So when God says he is jealous, it’s not an unloving thing but a LOVING thing. It is even stronger than the man with his new bride. Every man should be jealous for his wife. He should want that exclusive intimacy he shares with her not an action that is cheapened by being shared with anyone else. He alone has the right to that kind of love from her.

That is what God is saying also to Israel. He doesn’t want them with other gods. He alone has exclusive rights to her. He wants to love her with all he has and doesn’t want her to run after other suitors. In doing so, she doesn’t hurt God. She hurts herself. Those other suitors are no gods at all and they cannot give the love that he can give.

Sadly, what Oprah saw as unloving was one of the most loving at all. God loves so much that he used the cross to illustrate that and Ephesians 2 promises us God will spend the rest of the ages showing us how much he loves us.

I realize for a lot of people, this won’t answer the claim entirely about exclusivism. I will say in Christianity, God has a specific nature and he has a specific requirement and he’s made it very simple to get to him. It just simply requires that we give up being god. We just fall down and confess that only Christ can save us and not we ourselves and we will trust him with our eternity. In doing this, we live accordingly. For those interested in the journey, I recommend getting a copy of “Basic Christianity” by John Stott.

So where do I think Tolle went wrong ultimately? That will be answered tomorrow.

Tonight, we’re going to look at what Eckhart Tolle has to say about Christianity in history and in the present. This won’t include his use of Scripture as that has already been covered. Unfortunately, as we will see, Tolle does give a lot of misinformation but this misinformation is the kind that has been spread around so far that people think it’s common knowledge.

To begin with, on page 6, he talks about teachers like Buddha, Jesus, and others. (Honestly, as a Christian, it is completely hideous to me to see Jesus included among others as teachers when he is above them all.) He speaks that for these “teachers” that their message was largely misunderstood and greatly distorted. That will be dealt with later in response to whether Christ’s teachings were misunderstood and distorted. However, he does say “It certainly did not transform human behavior except in a small number of people.”

Unfortunately for Tolle, this is simply false. Christianity turned the world upside-down. (Actually it started turning it right-side up.)

This hit in a world where the Jews were a more obscure people to most and their teachings were in the minority as the culture as a whole was highly polytheistic and resurrection was a concept not accepted by the Greeks. (Yes, people who endorse the copycat thesis. You’re simply wrong.) As for morality, often a father would say a child, most likely a daughter, was not fit to live and the child would be left amongst wild animals. The coliseum had much bloodshed with prisoners being mercilessly killed for entertainment. A city like Corinth had so much sexual promiscuity it was a miracle to some that there was a church there. Not to mention, slavery was a basic institution of society.

Christianity changed all of that. They were known for the unusual lives they lived in that they did not live as the pagans did. They did good not for what they could get out of it, but simply because of what Christ did. Throughout history then, we saw a rise in the sciences, we saw the rise of capitalism, and we saw growth in education. Slavery ended eventually because of Christianity. I urge the reader to check Rodney Stark’s “The Victory of Reason.”

What Tolle says then is simply false. The Christian ethic has always brought about change when it’s been applied. This includes even later times in history such as the Wesleyan revival that hit England.

On page 16, he speaks about an intensification of the light of the original teaching of major religions. He then says “This is how Gnosticism and mysticism came into existence in early and medieval Christianity.”

I can imagine a number of medieval mystics easily taking offense at such a statement.

As for the idea of gnostic Christianity, it’s simply false. The gnostic gospels were never accepted for good reason. I simply suggest someone reads them if they want to know why. Does anyone think that Mary needs to make herself male to inherit the kingdom of Heaven as is said in the Gospel of Thomas? What of the Gospel of Peter having the high priest spending a night in a graveyard? (Something a high priest would never do.)

Gnosticism in fact goes against the teachings of Jesus in denying the goodness of the material world and relying on dualistic concepts. (How would that dualism fit in with Tolle’s Monism?) What happened is that the Gnostics wrote their own gospels that they then attached someone’s name to as was common in the ancient world. The early church though never accepted them and had no reason to believe that they came from the apostles. This is not the case with the canonical gospels.

A most unbelievable claim though is on pages 155-156 where Tolle speaks about the Inquisition as a period of about 300 years (Actually, it was longer) and that 3-5 million women were killed. Interestingly, at the same time, he claims that we do not know the exact number because no records were kept. (Then where exactly did he get his numbers from?)

I don’t know of any scholar of the Inquisition who would accept this. 3-5 million women?! Not at all!

So let’s be real.

The Inquisition did have a lot of injustice. That can’t be denied. However, it has largely been blown into an event it was not. It was not a reign of terror. By and large, the common person was pleased with the Inquisition for they helped to maintain order in the society. In fact, secular courts at the time were often worse than the Inquisition court.

Did they burn some heretics at the stake? Yes. They did. I don’t condone that at all. Did they use torture? Yes. They did. Note though that as soon as we say torture, we have an emotionally laden term. Many stories have been invented about types of torture that were used and these types just weren’t. It is very difficult now to separate fact from fiction, but there are many scholars who are thankfully doing the work.

In the Spanish Inquisition, for instance, the most famous one, it has been said that 3,000 were probably killed. That Inquisition lasted for longer than 300 years as well. That is nowhere near Tolle’s number of 3-5 million women. I have great concern for a writer when he doesn’t bother to list any sources for study on the Inquisition and doesn’t even get the basic facts straight. I recommend the reader to Henry Kamen’s “The Spanish Inquisition” and to Dinesh D’Souza’s “What’s So Great About Christianity?”

For the treatment of women later on pointed at, Christianity has done a great service for women. Women were seen as being image bearers of the image of God alongside males. Men were told that they should be ready to die for their wives if need be. Because of Christianity, marriage was exalted beyond anything it has been before and women have been more valued.

It seems Tolle is just wrong with his statements and this should be of concern. If he cannot be trusted on physical things, then why on spiritual things?

Also, let it be understood I don’t mean that Tolle is knowingly spreading misinformation. I just don’t think he’s looked into the questions enough and has simply spoken what is seen as common knowledge in the mainstream.

A hurdle must be crossed though that touches the question of religion and that is the question of exclusivism. That will be dealt with tomorrow.