(June 2, 2015 at 4:07 am)robvalue Wrote: If I picked up the bible, and I knew absolute nothing about it, I'd assume it was a fictional story book, vaguely based around some historic events.
Why should I think differently? Why I should I even think the intention of the authors is to be taken as non-fiction? Just because we don't know who they are, doesn't mean we can just decide for them why they wrote it. We can only speculate as to the real reasons. Even Christians would be sceptical about the accuracy and intentions of the authors if it were any other book involving gods.
It is hard to know what, exactly, the intentions are of writers, particularly ancient ones whose view of the world was radically different from ours. Early writers seem to have a very loose grasp on the concept of history, and have a hard time sticking to facts.
(June 2, 2015 at 4:07 am)robvalue Wrote: I wish I could somehow set it up so that Christians could, for one day, lose all memory of anything to do with Christianity, and then present them with the bible. What would they make of it? Would they come to the conclusions they hold now, or would they dismiss it as fiction, delusion or propaganda? I'd bet a weeks worth of slop on the latter being almost always the case.
That is wishing for magic, so it isn't going to happen.
There is, though, this interesting lesson to learn from it. How do you know that your most basic beliefs are not equally nonsensical? As billions of religionists prove, one can feel absolutely certain of ridiculous, unfounded nonsense. The inability to think otherwise is no indication that one is not believing utter rubbish.
"A wise man ... proportions his belief to the evidence."
— David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, Section X, Part I.
