Wednesday 30 November 2022

Evil Simplified


                                                       Dr Mike Licona, in Repose

Dr Mike Licona is a well-respected, tenured professor, in New Testament studies. Due to my interest in theology, I have followed his work and enlivened my day by watching videos where he is involved in vigorous debates with other scholars. Though I often disagree with Dr Licona's theological stance, he is undoubtedly an erudite gentleman with a passion for his work. For context: Dr Licona, besides his academic credentials, is also a committed Christian. He sincerely believes Jesus' resurrection is provable based on sound historical methodology. This places him as an academic outlier. The consensus amongst historians is that the resurrection cannot be understood using the tools available to the historian and the matter is only intelligible in the context of faith.

Today, I came across a short video of Dr Licona addressing an audience of young Christians. A member of the audience asked Dr Licona a question concerning the problem of evil. In essence, it revolves around the following: how can a loving god permit evil. To my mind this problem is one of the most fundamental and important questions that need to be addressed by thoughtful Christians, and, in my opinion, the failure to obtain a satisfactory answer is a serious impediment to a belief in the Christian god. Dr Licona's reply was both illuminating and distressing. Indeed, his answer was rather bizarre and frankly, odd. First off, he effectively states that a belief in a deity is a prerequisite for the basis of objective morality. Does he really believe that atheists can't have a sound grasp of morality? Clearly, you don't have to believe in a supernatural agency to understand that killing and stealing are bad. These moral precepts form the basis for the formation of any civilised society. Surely we are not to follow the morals of  Jahweh of the Old Testament, whereby he indiscriminately destroys whole populations of Caanaites using Joshua and the Israelite armies as an instrument of death. The citizens of Jericho are put to death because god wants the land for his 'Chosen People'. This is hardly a morally edifying tale for us to emulate.

Dr Licona goes on to expand/expound his thesis by using the Holocaust as an example. He argues, that the event happened on the 'cusp of the nuclear age' and the evil of Hitler forced the Allied nations to wage war and defeat him. He goes on to say, that had the Allies intervened later, Hitler may have had the time to develop nuclear weapons. And if that was the case he may well have succeeded in becoming the master of the world. I find the whole argument specious reasoning in the extreme. He treats a very serious theological issue in a simplistic, superficial manner. This is not the answer I would expect from a scholar of his calibre. No doubt the problem of moral evil is an issue that is difficult for serious theologians to tackle. It is a debate that stretches back to the ancient Greeks and subsequently, there have been many sophisticated attempts to explain the disparity between god's supposed 'goodness' and the manifest evil in this world. Dr Licona should know better than present the problem in such a facile way. 

Dr Licona's sincere faith blinds him and I suspect supersedes his academic rigour when it comes to Christian theology. He starts from the premise that the bible elicits literal truth and proceeds to fit the evidence into his own agenda and belief system. This is not how historians work in the modern intellectual arena. Like scientists, they should follow the evidence and then formulate their conclusions accordingly. Often, with limited data to hand, historians, if they are to be intellectually honest, must admit that many of their conclusions are tentative at best. This is not how Dr Licona presents his case and conclusions. His glib and trite response does him no service at all and indeed makes him appear rather shallow, naive and straight-out, silly.  

Am I being overly harsh in my assessment? Listen and weep, and let me know what you think in the comments.



   

         

18 comments:

  1. You are definetly not harsh enough. Religion is a mortal assasin on intelligence, the natural enemy of logic, an instrument of Orwellish Education in it´s very worst way. What can you expect from am academic-system, when you can get a doctorrate in that purest fictional superstition at university, or become a professor with fine salary and social reputation like that crank looney. One God, one Reich, one Führer - simplified evil. It´s worth to google the 20th cent. Jesuit´s chief strategic Georges Lemaitre - who invented the "big bang theory" and recruited guys like Steven Hawking for the Acadamy of the Vatikan, to establish their second Donaldism at Universities worldwide, named Cosmology (or Church-physics, like Albert Einstein called it). Man still has a far way to go and religions do anything to prevent him from that.

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    1. Indeed Josh, we certainly live in strange times. Religion has always been anti-science and when it held secular power suppressed innovative scientific findings, by the sword and fire if need be.

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  2. forgot to mention, that there is no need for evil to disprove the existence of god, jahweh, allah, bog, zeus, deus, aton, adonai... Lots of names for the same chap, created by Pharao Echn Aton (worth to google too - hubby of Nefertiti, daddy of Tuth Enck Amun... incredible tricky arse) - in about 1450 b.c.. Knowing the author of a character, you have the 100% prove that it´s just fictional.

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  3. Sackerson here. First, I would differentiate Christianity from the Bible as a whole, which is not a book but an incomplete collection of texts from different times, of different types and subjects and by different authors, and with different ideas of how to tell truth.

    I would also say that there are at least two Biblical narratives: that of God's plan for His chosen people (entailing war etc) and His rules for how the chosen people should behave within their own community. I'm not a Biblical scholar, theologian or preacher, but in the New Testament Jesus is puzzled once or twice by non-Jews asking his advice; and it seems Saul/Paul was the one who argued for the extension of Christian membership to the 'uncircumcised.'

    I think that it is difficult to show that morality is obective. Ideas of specific right and wrong actions differ from one culture to another. One can observe that many people agree that e.g. murder is wrong, and explain that the rule has implications for group survival, yet still we can't say why that 'ought' to be the rule or even that the group 'ought' to survive.

    So far the only way I think the objectivity of morality can be established is if you unite God the Lawgiver with God the Creator: if He made the Universe and also our moral laws, then we can no more argue with the latter than object to the law of gravity.

    Despite clever stuff about other and earlier (or later) religions, nothing before or since Jesus matches his radical and deceptively simple formulation summing up all the Law and the prophets in two commandments (Mark 31). He is not responsible for what the Church, theologians, radicals and rebels and so-called Christians have done with what he said. We struggle with what he meant as we struggle with the implications of E=MC2; so simple we can't understand it, or rather can't face applying it; it would mean changing ourselves deeply. Psychiatrists know how their patients fight against that.

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  4. Correction: Mark 12: 29-31

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  5. Hello Mr S. Good to see you back. I appreciate that the bible, especially the OT is a disparate set of books written over many centuries and with many authors with many agendas. I think you are right that objective morality is difficult to achieve and that there is a degree of moral plasticity depending on the civilisation in question and their degree of moral development. That sad, there are certain core 'moral codes' that percolate through all societies that are deemed 'civilised'. This does not mean that so-called 'barbarian' societies where not without `a moral compass. Clearly, concerning all civilizations (past and present) a moral code, for the sake of societal cohesion and stability is essential. Moral compliance and injunctions concerning murder, stealing, 'coverting your neighbour's wife' is required of its populace. Otherwise, societal degeneration and collapse will ensue. I don't accept that a belief in a supernatural deity is essential for a 'moral code', otherwise you could argue that all atheists are not subject to morality, and this is clearly not the case. As regard what Jesus said. It has proved difficult to uncover his actual sayings. The gospels are not verbatim commentaries of what Jesus said and did.

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  6. Murder, stealing and 'coveting your neighbour's wife' appears to be a summary of the USA today, with their (government-funded and approved) pressure groups such as BLM and Antifa. And as they got away with stealing the Presidential election and installing a dementia sufferer, the emboldened Demrats repeated their tricks to steal the mid-terms.

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    1. I agree that Jo is definitely in the throes of cognitive decline. Also, his son, Hunter, is a fucking disgrace. It shows the inequality in society rather starkly. Anyone else would be doing 5 to 7 years in the state prison. The hypocrisy is palpable and sickening.

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  7. I meant to add - despite being a nation of church-goers, America has lost its way and their bastardized version of Christianity seems to be void of any moral imperatives. It's all superficial lip-service with no substance.

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  8. a whatever morality of the christians was always pretended only and (in best case) something for the sheep, but never for the sheperds. If they ever will get back all their former (midages) powers, they will immediately start again with burning witches, torture dungeons, holy wars (in the 30years war territories only one third of the whole population survived) and any kind of horror they used to spread in the name of their fictional super wizzard named god (in germanic tongues). And the other versions of abrahameic monotheism are even worse. By the way. Sure Jesus is a chap worth to deal with, but never forget, that he is absolute fiction/fantasy only. (same way as it is worth to deal with Harry Potter or Mr Spock). The romans was pretty busy in reporting their news - so we still can read a lot about Pontius Pilatus, King Herodes (they did not live same time) or Caesar Augustus/Octavian of course, but not a single word about a spectacular magician named Jesus (able to run on water, to return from death....). Good entertainment but nothing of real substance and part of the worst terror-organisation in mankinds history (the Vatikan still have exorcists and a department of inquisition vital yet) that may be more subtile but not less mean today.

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  9. [Sackerson]: @Flaxen Saxon: 'I don't accept that a belief in a supernatural deity is essential for a 'moral code'' - agreed, but I think it may be essential if you wish to hold that the moral code is objective, not dependent on human wishes. The Thuggee were OK with murder because their goddess Kali authorised it.

    @Anon 2 Dec 12:06 - Jesus did exist. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sources_for_the_historicity_of_Jesus

    @Ed P: My American brother tells me much of American Christians esp. Southern Baptists. I think many of them would be shunned or pitied if they were in the UK.

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    1. Not sure why believers are so blessed with 'objective' morality and the godless not so endowed. I will acknowledge that the study of morality is a minefield. Tis a difficult field of study and acolytes should be wary and tread lightly. Personally, I have not come to any concrete conclusions with regard morality. It remains a slippery chimaera and any absolute definition is beset with paradoxes not easily resolved.

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    2. I think that ultimately is the whole schtick and I'm not sure I've seen any sort of debate, argument, difference, witch trial or whatever which doesn't basically see the atheist/agnostic/doubter... as morally defective/degenerate in some way. All roads of argument used by the religious seem to end there.

      Of course, once you take that view, that enables you to do just about anything. As Christopher Hitchens observed, never forget what these people do when they have power.

      There are religions and religions of course, but is there one that doesn't have this somewhere in it and is it not the basis of the whole religious urge? And what is it that might keep it suppressed?

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    3. Did Jesus exist? The link to a Wiki page is inconclusive - Paul wrote about Him 20 to 30 years after His alleged death. I'm sure my memories of events in 1992 are hazy; certainly any I wrote down would be partly fictional. Even memories of big events, such as the 1987 storm which destroyed 25% of the trees in Kent, no longer seem so clear - did I see fallen trees everywhere, or is the memory from the retelling?
      Then there's the Roman stuff about Mithras, from which it seems a lot of Christian beliefs originate...

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    4. Personally, I believe that Jesus did exist. In fact, we have a host of evidence for his existence.

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  10. again - God, Allah, Adon(ey) - was invented by Pharao Eckn Aton by forming the polytheistic egyptian god of the sun (Aton) into the single montheistic god of the Jews. Christians and Muslims are just later versions of that. No fictional character can have a real son (born by a virgin and the holy ghost, could bring dead man back to life incl. himself...). Yes Jesus exists, just like Heracles son of Zeus or Thor son of Odin - mythology exists, but the characters are not real. Logic is real (if our communication here is no bizarre illusion) - because writing or language, mathematics or any other system would collapse without logic.

    Any moral code can only depend on human wishes/thinking (most times on a majority of it). In the USA we have 29 states with death penalty and 21 without - so even that christian nation has no common/objective morality code. Great good fortune that Britain of the 1940s preferred a very different morality than Germany, Italy or Spain - all christian countries. Not so optimistic that the UK is still that bright anymore (to shun Amercian Baptists). Well, enough. Have fun, fellows.

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  11. The beauty of believing in a pantheon of gods (Greek, Roman etc.) is that you have 'room' to blame evil gods or trickster gods for the bad things that happen to good people without invalidating what the good gods do.

    The Christian versions of the single god (the Trinity - what's that all about) fought long and hard to supress versions where the Devil (or other versions of Gnosticism) also existed. Having established that there is only one god they are stuck with having to explain bad things. Falling back on 'faith' or god moving in mysterious ways is a cop out - for if you cannot understand god what basis have you for an 'objective' morality?

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    1. thank God for our banquet... and for the starving of the poor

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