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Free to question religion



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Published Date: 08 September 2008
Though not an atheist, I agree with Ian Stewart's view (Letters, 5 September) that in a free society those who reject religion must be able to make a reasonable statement of their position without it being regarded as offensive on point of principle. Nor should it be seen as offensive for a rationalist to ask why a form of delusion (a belief without basis in fact), might be implicitly protected from challenge by those who do not share it.
If such a principle of protection is extended very far, the stability of our pluralistic society will be under threat.



ROD WALLACE

Standalane

Kincardine, Fife


The full article contains 108 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
Page 1 of 1

  • Last Updated: 07 September 2008 8:22 PM
  • Source: The Scotsman
  • Location: Edinburgh
 
1

StuartAD,

West Lothian 08/09/2008 08:02:59
There has been more written about Jesus the Christ than anything else on earth. Not only that, a lot of it has been written withing thirty years of his death. Scholars believe anything written a thousand years after the event, in other countries in the Middle Near East, so why dis-believe the written facts about Jesus?
I respect their stand, we as Christians only wish for a level playing field.
2

Southern Cross,

08/09/2008 09:05:14
StuartAD - an enormous amount has been written about Robin hood - but it's still mythology. The problem with the writings about Jesus is that they're contradictory and inconsistent - the gospels in particular. The volume of the material therefore undermines the claims!
3

wayne bijlyeerheid,

08/09/2008 09:32:07
stuart ad, what sort of a "level playing field" do Christians wish for?
One where the law doesn't force schools to inflict Christian religious dogma on children thereby distorting their views?
One where a teachers' belief or non-belief does not affect their chance of employment in certain state funded Christian schools?
One where the state broadcasting company is not under an obligation to provide a platform for uncritical dissemination of Christian religious creed.
You're no martyr, your beliefs are not constrained by any law, not even the law of reason, on the contrary in many cases your are subsidised by the taxpayer and protected by the force of law.
Christians, and other religious believers, in the UK are priviledged not disadvantaged.
4

zeno,

www.thinkhumanism.com 08/09/2008 12:52:24
StuartAD said: "Not only that, a lot of it has been written withing thirty years of his death."

No, very little about Jesus was written within 30 years of his death. In fact, much of what was written was written by people who never even knew him.

wayne bijlyeerheid: Well said.
5

Heretic_,

www.secularism.org.uk 08/09/2008 13:05:27
Well said.

Religions are just ideas, and as such should be subject to the same level of analysis, criticism and even ridicule as any other idea, be it political, scientific or philosopohical in nature.

To deny this right is to deny freedom of expression and is detrimental to humanity's development.

The problem is, the only religions that survive and flourish in the modern era are those which are intolerant and suppress criticism. For this reason Islam and Evangelical Christianity are growing, while the established church in the UK is withering on the vine - it's been in decline ever since they stopped torturing and burning heretics.
6

G,

dundy 08/09/2008 13:07:19
It is always thus...those who speak up for the theism often get their facts wrong...says it all....
7

Maximus,

Roberton 08/09/2008 13:47:42
Ah ha, Robin Hood, Robin Hood riding through the glen, Robin Hood, Robin Hood with his merry men, robs from the rich, gives to the poor Robin Hood, Robin Hood … a bit like Jesus and his disciples but without the stealing part.

So where were we? Ah yes, someone who is mythical (Jesus according to #2) deserves an equal footing with someone else who is mythical (RH also according to #2). I propose we allow TV license fee to be used to fund a 13 part drama on the life of Christ to be shown at primetime Saturday night. What about a major film starring Kevin Costner and a film score that stays at No 1for 16 weeks? Any objections? Why? Ah but RH was mythical too.

Oh I see, at least the followers of RH don’t force us to do things we don’t want to do. Happy Birthday Humanae Vitae! Good to see your predictions have been borne out in today’s headlines.

I guess quite a lot has been written about Jesus by many people who didn’t even know him. Does that include John, Matthew and those who knew his followers like Luke and Mark, or those who knew them? What about the Patristic period? Oh boy could we keep this tradition of story writing up? Remind me not to write a biography on Kind James I because I didn’t know him!

Now then did Robin Hood really exist? I don’t know I haven’t researched him. I haven’t looked into everything that was written about him. I haven’t looked at the things that followed from him or his followers. I haven’t looked into what he taught or did. I haven’t checked all there is to know about him. Perhaps I should before I start labelling him as a myth.
8

Heretic_,

08/09/2008 14:44:15
Maximus, I think you miss the point.

Jesus Christ may indeed have been a real human being, but that in itself doesn't lend any more weight to his ideas than those of other real human beings such as Karl Marx, Albert Einstein, Charles Darwin or Friedrich Nietzsche.

Ultimately, Jesus asks us to believe in and worship a supernatural being, and the sad fact is that not a shred of evidence for this entity's existence has been unearthed in nearly 2,000 years since.

Of course, this hasn't stopped countless atrocities being perpetrated in His name. Only with God on your side could you justify the Inquisition, the Crudades, the 9/11 suicide murders, the Vatican's denial of contraception and AIDS prevention, the subjugation of women and repression of natural sexual urges, not to mention many other miscellaneous tortures, genocides and burnings over the centuries.
9

wheels5894,

08/09/2008 20:37:56
Well, having just returned from Cyprus,the birthplace of Aphrodite, I should hope that she should be allowed as much airtime as any other , later deities. After all, I don't recall Jesus every denying Aphrodite's existence or significance.
10

zeno,

www.thinkhumanism.com 08/09/2008 22:45:46
Maximus said: "I guess quite a lot has been written about Jesus by many people who didn’t even know him. Does that include John, Matthew and those who knew his followers like Luke and Mark, or those who knew them?"

There is scant mention of Jesus in any literature of the time. As far as I'm aware, the following contemporary writers didn't even give one sentence to him. I’m sure the list is incomplete but it includes every scholar, historian, philosopher, mathematician, astronomer, writer I can find who lived during or up to two centuries after Jesus’ time. Given that Jesus was supposedly out there performing miracles and making quite a name for himself, it’s surely reasonable to expect a mention of him from at least some of the intellectual powerhouses of the era.

4 CE to 97 CE
Philo Judaeus
Apollonius of Tyana
Justus of Tiberias

0 CE to 100 CE
Velleius Paterculus
Quintus Curtius Rufus
Marcus/Lucius Anneus Seneca
C. Musonius Rufus
Plutarch of Chaeronea
Di Chrysostum (Cocceianus Dio)
Pliny the Elder
Marcus Fabius Quintilianus
Publius Papinius Statius
Dio of Prusa
Silius Italicus
Sextus Julius Frontinus
Marcus Valerius Martialus

100 CE to 200 CE
Epictetus
Theon of Smyrna
Decimus Junius Jevenalis
Nicomachus of Gerasa
Lucius Annaeus Florus
Hierocles
Thallus
Phlegon
Favorinus
Pliny the Younger
Tacitus
Suetonius
Aelius Aristides
Albinus
Aristocles of Messene
Arrian
Menelaus Of Alexandria
Ptolemy
Marcus Cornelius Fronto
Marcus Aelius Aurelius Antoninus
Mara Bar-Serapion
Lucius Apuleius
Apollodorus
Appian
Aulus Gellius
Cassius Maximus Tyrius
Hephaestion of Alexandria
Numenius of Apamea
Tiberia Claudius Herodes Atticus
Lucian of Samosata
Galen
Celsus


The usual sources quoted as evidence of Jesus' existence and life include:

Tacitus
According to the internet research I've done, Tacitus writings provide evidence for the existence of Christians - people who believed the Christ has walked the earth about a cent
11

zeno,

www.thinkhumanism.com 08/09/2008 22:48:37
OOps! Ran out of space.

Tacitus
According to the internet research I've done, Tacitus writings provide evidence for the existence of Christians - people who believed the Christ has walked the earth about a century earlier - but not for the historical Jesus.

Seutonius
Suetonius refers (in his work ‘Lives of the Caesers’) not to Jesus but to one ‘Chrestus’. Chrestus was a common Greek name and was also a mystic name for an Initiate. This Chrestus seems to have been active in Rome and was therefore unlikely to have been Jesus Christ.

Josephus
Josephus spent whole pages on minor criminals yet supposedly wrote a tiny passage about this alleged conductor of miracles. This passage – the Testamonium Flavianum – is not considered reliable evidence by most non-Christian scholars. There are various versions of the passage and none of them are considered to have been written by Jospehus. The weight of evidence suggests it inserted centuries later by Eusebius. The other reference to Jesus is also thought to be a later interpolation. An enormous amount has been written about Josephus’ two alleged references to Jesus – well, there would be given that they are pretty much the only ‘evidence’ we have for him – and much of this is available on the web.

Assorted Rabbinical writings e.g. Talmud, Midrash: The references were most probably written by those acquainted with the New Testament.

Pretty poor evidence for the existence of Jesus, never mind his alleged birthright.


 

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