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My Take: Poll on bin Laden's death reveals a disposable Jesus
By Stephen Prothero, Special to CNN A few years ago, I was walking through the streets of Indianapolis with a friend. Whenever anyone asked us for money, she would offer a dollar or two. I asked her why she did this. She replied, “Because Jesus said so.” I didn’t believe her. “Where in the Bible does it say that?” I asked, and she responded with chapter and verse, Matthew 5:42: "Give to him who asks of you, and do not turn away from him who wants to borrow from you." (Luke 6:30, I should add, says basically the same thing.) This passage is one of the so-called “hard sayings” of Jesus. It comes in a barrage of equally hard sayings toward the end of the Sermon on the Mount, where Jesus tells his followers to turn the other cheek, give away your coat if someone sues you for your shirt, and “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven" (Matthew 5:44-45). The chatter around a poll released Wednesday by the Public Religion Research Institute and the Religion News Service will likely focus on the findings highlighted in their news release: 82% of Americans surveyed believe that bin Laden distorted the teachings of Islam to suit his own purposes; 65% believe the al Qaeda leader is rotting in hell; and 62% think it is wrong to celebrate the death of another human being. Survey: Most Americans say it's wrong to celebrate bin Laden's death What amazes me, however, is how disposable Christianity and the Bible are in this conversation. America, it seems, has become a nation of Christians of convenience, who trot Jesus out when he suits their politics and prejudices only to hide him away when he does not. Americans are apparently split down the middle on whether the golden rule is an eternal moral law or a disposable human guideline. While we may pay lip service to the rule (which can be found in most of the world's religions), roughly half of us apparently think it doesn’t apply when it comes to torture. Only 53% of those surveyed say the United States should follow the golden rule and not use any methods on our enemies that we would not want used on our soldiers. Oddly, support for the golden rule in this case was actually lower (47%) among white evangelicals. In other words, when Jesus said, “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets” (Matthew 7:12), he didn’t really mean "everything." He thought there should be an exception in the case of waterboarding your enemies. One thing that struck me hard while researching my 2003 "American Jesus" book was how malleable Jesus is in the American imagination. Instead of lording over American life, telling us what to do, he seems to be taking orders from us, carrying our water. Or, as I put it back then, "The American Jesus is more a pawn than a king, pushed around in a complex game of cultural (and countercultural) chess, sacrificed here for this cause and there for another.” The latest altar on which we are sacrificing Jesus is the so-called war on terror. So here is my question for American Christians who claim the United States is a Christian nation. How Christian can a country be if even Bible believers cannot get behind something as basic to the Bible as the golden rule? Is Jesus really the lord of your life if his “hard teachings” can be so blithely ignored? The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Stephen Prothero.
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The CNN Belief Blog covers the faith angles of the day's biggest stories, from breaking news to politics to entertainment, fostering a global conversation about the role of religion and belief in readers' lives. It's edited by CNN's Dan Gilgoff and Eric Marrapodi, with daily contributions from CNN's worldwide newsgathering team and frequent posts from religion scholar and author Stephen Prothero.  |
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Editor's Note: Stephen Prothero, a Boston University religion scholar and author of "God is Not One: The Eight Rival Religions that Run the World," is a regular CNN Belief Blog contributor.
Adelina, It seems impossible for you to truly believe what you are saying. If you really believe those things, you are living in the 12th century, when everyone thought that the plague was a demon that needed to be excised. If you don't believe in science than the idea of heavier than air flight is impossible (think airplanes), the common cold is a cures from god for the commission of sin, and that the earth is the center of the universe.
Adelina's comments suggest he/she is not interested in serious dialogue.
Dialogue, no, but diatribe...
I thought the poll on bin Laden's death only revealed that liberal Americans are sissy. Nothing new, however.
You must really hate women, since you consist it an insult to attribute feminine qualities to liberals (some of whom are females).
You should also feel very lucky that the government is so conservative, since the population is THAT liberal.
I would be happy to engage you if you would bring your A game to the discussion, but I'm not convinced you have anything to say.
Adelina,
Be nice. Take a rigorous logic class, a statistics class, and learn the difference between fact and opinion. In the meantime, be nice. And, when you run out of things to say, stop talking. Sounding silly doesn't help your cause. (Unless you're from the other side and are being silly on purpose)
Joanna-
She's a troll, nothing more.
S. Prothero "thu-mps" Matt 5:42, one of the few passages said by the simple preacher man aka Jesus as per most contemporary NT scholars. Unfortunately, most of what he supposedly said and did was invented by Matthew et al.
For us contemporary and common folk:---------
Jesus was a bit "touched". After all he thought he spoke to Satan, thought he changed water into wine, thought he raised Lazarus from the dead etc. In today's world, said Jesus would be declared legally insane.
Or did P, M, M, L and J simply make him into a first century magic-man via their epistles and gospels of semi-fiction? Most contemporary NT experts after thorough analyses of all the scriptures go with the latter magic-man conclusion with J's gospels being mostly fiction.
Obviously, today's followers of Paul et al's "magic-man" are also a bit on the odd side believing in all the Christian mumbo jumbo about bodies resurrecting, and exorcisms, and miracles, and "magic-man atonement, and infallible, old, European, white men, and 24/7 body/blood sacrifices followed by consumption of said sacrifices.
So why do we really care what a first century CE, illiterate, long-dead, mostly-invented preacher man would do today? "Love thy neighbor" was around way before the first century CE.
to wit:
Ancient Egypt
"An early example of the Golden Rule that reflects the Ancient Egyptian concept of Maat appears in the story of The Eloquent Peasant which is dated to the Middle Kingdom (c. 2040–1650 BCE): "Now this is the command: Do to the doer to cause that he do."[6] An example from a Late Period (c. 664 BC – 323 BCE) papyrus: "That which you hate to be done to you, do not do to another."[9]
With respect to the apostles getting martyred, these stories are either highly embellished or simply myths. e.g. Peter and Paul were killed during of the Nero crackdown on the Christian cult. Historically, that is all that is known. No one knows the details of the executions. And being executed for one's religious beliefs would make Judaism the greatest of all religions if you want to use martyrdom as a criteria for authenticity.
To put it another way, if you were Christian and the overwhelming religious majority in this country believed that (a) Apollo pulled the sun across the sky with his chariot, and (b) you are an immoral, hateful person if you don't believe that, how would you respond? What if your boss, and his/her boss, and his/her boss believed that? What if most of your neighbors, your children's teachers, and your civic leaders believed that? If someone said to you, "You are evil and hateful, you're an unfit parent, and you're going to burn for eternity BECAUSE YOU DON'T BELIEVE IN APOLLO", how would you react? Think about it...
Leshon, we are already putting up with worse fictions than that, such as big bang theories. Explosion never causes order. The chance is 0. Christians are the only truely mature, tolerant humans.
"Christians are the only truely mature, tolerant humans."
Sadly, I am quite certain Adelina is entirely unaware of the irony contained in this sentence.
Nor, apparently, is she aware that there are people who study debris fields from explosions, and there actually is an order to them. I know catchy slogans are emotionally satisfying, but they aren't necessarily accurate.
Adelina, you wouldn't be typing on this computer if humanity had followed the teachings of religious scholars that claimed to know the truth. Lets start with Galileo and his discovery that the earth revolved around the sun. He was jailed by the Catholic Church for that and it only took them 400 years to admit he was right. Supposedly one large boat carried Noah and all life forms a long time ago. Explain to me how big that boat would have had to be to carry every current lifeform, and their food, on Earth on it. Now explain a place like Australia that has unique lifeforms. Are you saying that evolution is valid? Did the Ark circle the globe dropping everybody off at their home continents? How did it get those Australian animals when the planet would need to flood for it to travel to Australia. How come in Noah's time they still believed the world was flat when the flood, and the subsequent dropping off of animals, would have led to them to realize it was a globe. Oh yeah, they though it was flat. How else will the angles sit at the four corners of the Earth beating their wings to keep people from fleeing judgement, though it seems it would be impossible to flee a globe. Never mind the fact that humans would be horribly mentally and physically impaired from such a small group of ancestors. Lots of inbreeding.
There's this perception among many Christians that atheists "hate God", or that they are somehow inherently evil. I've even talked to Christians who think that atheists worship Satan because that's what their pastors told them. Atheism is simply the absence of belief in a divine or supernatural power. Religious leaders like to paint atheists as "anti-God". Saying that an atheist hates God is like saying that an adult hates the Easter Bunny. If some atheists come off as "haters", it's likely in response to years of people telling them they are evil, immoral people for not believing in the Easter Bunny. I know that sounds silly, but it's a fair comparison. If you don't believe in the Easter Bunny, you don't believe in the Easter Bunny. It doesn't make you a bad person.
Why do you hate the Easter Bunny? Did you get a bad egg when you were young?
Another dimension to add is that we atheists tend to know how religions are supposed to work so we can identify where hypocrisy like that mentioned in the article occurs. Of course, plenty of the faithful can also easily identify hypocrisy, as can many people of rival faiths, but they all seem be cowed into remaining silent due to their indoctrinated sense of being 'respectful' of other people's religious beliefs. We don't have that limitation and the truly hypocritical amongst the religious aren't shy about attacking other people's religious beliefs either which says a lot about the level of their religious conviction, doesn't it?
It seems somewhat ironic then that we atheists seem to serve as the voice of criticism for moderate people of faith against the extremist elements they are too afraid to challenge by themselves.
What about an "eye for an eye" and all of that other revenge crap in the bible? People dancing in the streets at the death of an infidel is a very "Christian" response, just like they do when a westener dies. In my experience "Christian' charity and compasison only extends to only other christians of the exact same sect, denomination and subsect. Everyone else is beneath contemt to them.
Scott, that's not true. Christians show love to their enemies AND carry out justice for everyone. The only infinitely balanced ideology for mankind in the universe.
@Scott..Jesus has told all of us to love our enemy, hasn't He?
*sigh* So many atheist comments full of nothing but hate, I pray that one day you'll find peace before your hatred consumes you.
So you think it's wrong to hate lies? How sad.
You prefer to think atheists are full of hate so you can feel smug and arrogant.
Disgusting. You show more actual hate than any atheist.
Atheists dealing with Christians are fortunate. They do all the hateful things against Christians and get love and prayers of blessings back from Christians. Atheists should repent of their hatred while they still have time on earth.
Atheists are born haters, they'll die the same.
@Wipeout: No, atheists can get educated just like others. Humans are capable of change as long as alive.
Not all atheists hate christians, and those who do are largely mirroring the hate they have received from individual "christians" in their life experience.
In my opinion, though, athiesm is no more coherent than any other religion. The lack of clear evidence for the existence of God does not prove the opposite hypothesis. There could be a lassiez faire God (get things started and let them play out); there is no evidence for or against such a proposition, so far as I know.
People all over the world have more than enough experiences with atheists not to be one. The Westerners who are bored with freedom are the fools who return to the barbarism of atheists. Maybe they need firsthand experience with real atheists.
I'm not an atheist, I believe in a creator but not religion. How very arrogant of you to assume that non-believers are full of hate. I do believe that you are portraying your hate onto others.
Be good to one another... the golden rule... etc... It doesn't take Jesus (or any other deity) to make that something we can all get behind. Everything beyond that is either politics or prejudice based on place of birth.
John, it's not that simple. A single cell is much more complicated than atheists' moral sense. In fact, you have none.
Sorry Ernie D, but your answer is totally irrelevant as you are completely missing the point. Since faith is all about tolerance and love, religious nuts are therefore non-faithful. Living in denial is a decision of some. However, shouldn’t being so anti-religion be labeled as anti-religion nuts?
Elie
I read your post again. It says nothing of the sort. I guess you should call yourself "Lie" instead of "Elie".
Faith is about believing something without a shred of proof. It's not about tolerance or love. Maybe you should look up the word in the dictionary. Faith has nothing to do with those things.
When you want to talk honestly, there are people here who appreciate that sort of thing.
A good vocabulary helps, too. Using words incorrectly just leads to misunderstandings.
Btw, you can call people "non-faithful" but you really have no idea do you?
Anyone can claim to be a believer. There is no way to prove they are lying.
Religions are based on lies. No proof exists of your god. That's why you "need" faith.
Because gullibility is an absolute requirement of every religion.
Why don't you look up "gullibility"? You might not know what that means either.
Gays, muslims, atheists. there you have it. Let me know which of those factions are tolerated by Christianity, having a bit of trouble finding that. And beyond tolerance, let me know how it makes sense that they are inherently "flawed" by being who they are by choice or by nature and why god made them that way. And while you are at it go ahead and explain why we'll all be in hell together.
As an agnostic, I want to agree somewhat with Elie here. I do think there is plenty of hate toward minority outgroups from christians, but I think that hate is based on selectively ignoring some of the bible. There are plenty of christians who do NOT share this hatred, but they are generally less vocal and thus less visible.
Who cares about Christian morality apart from Christians? Who needs it? It has out served its usefulness. People know what's right and wrong and they don't need outdated self-contradictory dogma to explain it.
I'm not a christian, but I think there is plenty of evidence that people either do not KNOW right from wrong, do not care, or at least are willing to make plenty of exceptions.
As long as people still buy into christianity, it will still function as a social proof (or premise) for persuasive arguments, and should thus be understood by others who seek to persuade. Personally, I think that the average christian isn't very good at rationalizing their inconsistencies when presented with a direct case such as this. I think the article is pretty much on point.
"The American Jesus is more a pawn than a king, pushed around in a complex game of cultural (and countercultural) chess, sacrificed here for this cause and there for another.”
... but if a pawn makes it to the other side it becomes a queen
I don't think we're talk about just America here, or even Christianity.
We're talking about all humanity.
Applications of the Bible is more complex than this simple article. Christians promote charity but not sloth or ignorance. Christians practice personal forgiveness but do not condone injustice.
I have an inescapable feeling that you are trying to take a simple and elegant teaching out of a mass of myriad other simple and fascile teachings and distort them to condone a barrage of negative cognative dissonances you assert are from complex situations. Love thy enemy means love thy enemy. In no part of "Treat others as you would have them treat you" does it say "I authorize you to make this statement relative and not take it as is, so that you may have peace of mind from conflicting emotions". I have no sympathy for Osama, however I felt no satisfaction upon hearing of his death, either. I am not holier than thou, but I just may be more empathetic than thou.
The existence itself is a clear cut proof of the existence of God. No matter what the theories behind how the universe came about are, no matter how we think it all started, even the smallest molecule of origin has had to be created. Nothing comes from nothing – basic law of energy; Wake up. Who are we to philosophize? Who are we without God? Shouldn’t we have learned yet that true happiness comes from our inner peace? Shouldn’t we have figured out yet that only faith, faith in God, is the only source that supplies our soul with peace, love, and hence happiness? A million dollar may facilitate lots of things, including “fun” substances; would it take our non-materialistic troubles away?
Elie
Your clear cut proof is not clear, is not cut, and is not proof. It is nothing but your delusional take on it. I could say the same thing about kittens because they are so cute that they prove god exists, but they are only proof that cuteness exists.
Your existence only proves that you exist. It does not prove that anyone else exists. Wake up yourself.
Inner peace comes from distancing oneself from insanity. I have plenty of it as long as there are no religious nuts around.
Sorry, Elie.....that's just another teleological argument. And, no, the unquestioning faith in a deity is not necessary to experience peace, love and happiness....just ask a Buddhist. Some have already said it here: when you get right down to it, the Golden Rule is all you really need. That's why Jesus said it was "the Law and the Prophets", and why it appears in all the major religions in one form or another. What all the religions fail to mention, however, is that it's also the most difficult one to follow!
If existence proves there is a prior cause, which you call God, it comes nowhere close to proving that such a God (a) still exists (b) has any interest in us (c) is remotely close to the description offered by ANY religion or (d) is knowable in a way that could valid any religion over any other one...including one that I make up right now.
How about this one...the lack of clear visible evidence shows that God has gone into hiding and does not want to be found. Religious people are like the paparazzi – always trying to track down and harass God instead of respecting what any decent person would understand as a clear request for privacy. Thus religious people, and NO ONE ELSE, will be sent to hell for refusing to stop pestering a higher deity.
What EVIDENCE can you offer that your religion is even SLIGHTLY more probable than that one?
@Steven Turner:
Apparently, you did not read the article very carefully, or you don't understand Christianity very well. The author is addressing Christians, not Jews or other religious people. Christians believe that the teachings of Jesus in the New Testament take precedence over the teachings in the Hebrew Bible or Old Testament. So your citation of the story of David and Goliath is not really relevant and is not a good objection to his argument.
I see you are interpreting the article about how interpretations are interpreted by the author who interprets things his own way for a living, and he appears to be talking about Christianity. If you interpret it that way of course. Maybe there's a "deeper meaning" in there for all of us!
All you have to do is interpret it that way. You are lost in a washing machine of interpretation. Wait until the spin cycle is done and maybe you'll be able to keep from puking. Not even Prothero's words are free from differing interpretations and all he did was write this article!
So your assumptions of what the author was "truly" (I have to laugh at this point) saying in his article may not be all of what he was "truly" saying.
I keep laughing and it gets hard to write this. Truly.
We will never be like Jesus on Earth because of the sins around us and in us but we should try to do what God calls us to do and thoughs are in the Bible and we should follow his words. OBL did things he know we would react to but it wasn't the act of religion it was the government trying to protect our country... Jesus would have forgiven him if he was on Earth and we all know that...
Wasn't there plenty of sin surrounding Jesus? Wasn't he human, and tempted just as strongly as any of us? You, my friend, are just offering excuses.
This type of article will make American's mad because they do not like the truth. They like whatever makes them feel good at the moment. It brings some good questions to mind and describes with exactness the majority of professing Christians in America. Most are only professing and not practicing Christians.
Actually, the majority of American Christians like the truth. That is why they are Christians.
Did David rejoice when Goliath was killed? Or .. did he practice "the golden rule"? The author of this article is, as has been pointed out earlier .. Bible Illiterate.
To Steve Turner:
Christ gave you the golden rule and died for your sins...not David. This of why you call yourself a Christian and not a "Davidian". Personally, I'll stick with the instructions of the one who saved me.
@ Steven Turner: Actually, I think David is a pretty good example of the concept articulated in the article. After killing Goliath, who according to scriptures was from Gath, David later allied with the King of Gath to escape Saul. Even to the point of wiping out innocent villages, and telling the king of Gath he was doing this to Israelite settlements (I Sam 27). So David certainly used God and "political" alliances for his personal gain. Theological message from David – not that he was great...but that, despite his many faults, God still accomplished good through him.
Steven Turner-
Follow David's example over Jesus'? Fine, if you are Jewish, but the article was aimed at Christians, right? Christians supposedly follow Jesus' example, and nobody else's.
American greatness is disposable as the Bible-illiterates are teaching religion in American schools.
2 Tim 2:14. John 3:16 – 19.
Simple. Easy. No shredding of theological points in order to make an argument from which there should be no argument. Christianity is easy. My yoke is easy, my burden lgiht. If a person might simply get out of the way of their personal obstacles they could easily see, believe, live, love and have an underlying foundation of joy all their lives.
Or they can argue.
I know which I choose (false theologians – that which was chosen for me...)
Sure, but the article seems to imply that many are not so much 'following' Jesus as prodding him from behind to where they want to go, like a hostage, or a (human) shield.
There is word to describe what this article is about – HYPOCRISY, spelled intentionally in Caps.
Yes, that America is a hypocritical nation- not a christian one. In a nation of supposed high ideals, we perpetrate more than our fair share of crime, infidelity, betrayal, broken relationships and broken promises.
In an attempt to "blend in" many christians have abandoned the precepts of the faith and- like the larger culture- live values based on how they feel rather than what's advanced in the bible. Rather than take up our cross and risk being the outsider, many christians adopted a relativistic faith that depends on culture, upbringing, personal outlook and/or mood. Many of us have caved into the pressure to appear to have more 'dynamic' beliefs guided mostly by personal dictates rather than biblical precepts- or even God Himself/Herself.
Like our countrymen, we become a God unto ourself, when convenient. One nation under God- when we feel like it.
Yes, hypocrisy is rife in the church. The nation is not much better. Will christians do the right thing, however unpopular it may be or will we continue to be co-opted and trampled underfoot by cynics and antagonists. That's christendom's call to make.
Will our nation continue to be a people who rail against the lack of mercy and righteousness of some, scorning them with righteous indignation and judging them mercilessly? That's EVERYONE'S call to make.
"He who is without sin, cast the first stone." These words were directed to those who accused someone caught doing wrong things because he knew their heart. They were more interested in seeing the wrongdoer condemned and trying to trap Jesus between mercy and justice.
Instead, the condemner is sent away condemned. The sinner is sent away forgiven BUT admonished to do better the next time. If Mr. Prothero came away from Jesus' teaching he would know the beauty of Jesus' wisdom lie in his words to the wrongdoer:
"Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin." Those are the words that restores what was broken to wholeness.
Just saying...