What Would I Put in the Bible?

Andrew Hall over at Laughing in Purgatory asked a handful of bloggers what they would put in the bible if they the chance. The obvious topics to hit seemed to me to be skepticism, sex, slavery, and women. I got a little carried away and wrote about all of them instead of picking one. Here was my entry on slavery:

10 Conduct yourselves with honor in all things. 11 Treat your fellow man with the utmost respect and always provide him with a fair deal even when you have him at a disadvantage. 12 You are never permitted to own another person under any circumstances. 13 I, your God, have provided everyone with the freedom to control their own lives, it is of the utmost evil to remove from them this right, thus saith the Lord.

To see the rest of the entries, as well as the rest of the Book of Hausdorff, go check out Laughing in Purgatory

Revelation 22: The End

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The River of Life (v. 1-5)

The river of life will flow through the streets and the tree of life will grow on either side with 12 kinds of fruit that grow every month. The leaves of the tree will be for the healing of the nations. There will be no night, the light of God will be your light instead of lamps or the sun.

I'm not really sure what the leaves part means, the rest of it sounds pretty good. I'm guessing that getting enough food was a problem back then, so having food year round coming off of these trees would sound like paradise. I'm also not really sure I understand the thing about light.

According to Guzik, the Greek word that is being translated into "healing" can also mean "health-giving" or "therapeutic". I'm still not sure I really understand what that means.

Jesus Is Coming (v. 6-21)

Jesus is coming very soon, it says so 5 times in this short section.

It's hard to imagine that by soon he meant thousands of years. This is nothing new, we've been over this point a bunch of times.

We see the same justification for this, that the Greek word means suddenly not soon. Given the message here and the apparent urgency being used, I think this is a pretty unreasonable reading of the text.

Let the evildoer still do evil, the filthy be filthy, the righteous do right, and the holy be holy.

What do you mean "let the evildoer do evil"? I thought we were in the business of saving souls? In fact, this might be another time that demonstrates how close we are supposed to be to the end, it is so close you shouldn't even bother converting people any more.

There are some who are not allowed to enter the city gates and get to the tree of life: "the dogs and sorcerers, the sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices falsehoods."

This is pretty much the same list we saw before. One thing I find interesting, is that these people are even around on our new earth. If they didn't make it to heaven, shouldn't they be burning in the lake of fire? Are they on the new earth but just not in the city? This doesn't seem to match up too well to our picture of the afterlife.

But outside are dogs and sorcerers and sexually immoral and murderers: What about those outside? We shouldn’t think that outside the walls of heaven multitudes will throng, longing to get in. “The verse does not intend to teach that in the eternal state all manner of wicked men will be living just outside the heavenly city. It simply describes the future with the imagery of the present.” (Mounce)

I'm sorry, but this is completely idiotic. It is clearly talking about the city gates of new Jerusalem. 

The words in this book are true, if anyone adds anything to it or takes anything away from it, you will take part in the plagues and be denied the tree of life.

A last ditch effort to tell people not to edit the book, seems like a reasonable request.

Finished!

Picture from run-nyc.com

Well, that marks the end of the new testament. I can't believe I've now read the whole thing. Now I just have to tackle the old testament =D

What lessons are in this chapter?

--Apocalypse--

Revelation 22:6,7,10,12,20 Jesus is coming back soon

"what must soon take place...I am coming soon...the time is near...I am coming soon...Surely I am coming soon"

--Lists--

Revelation 22:15 list of things that will keep you out of new Jerusalem

"Outside are the dogs and sorcerers and the sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices falsehood."

Revelation 21: The Streets are Paved with Gold

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The New Heaven and the New Earth (v. 1-8)

Then John saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the old earth had passed away and the sea was no more.

It's funny, I didn't quite make this connection until the mention of the sea, during the time of the apocalypse, the sea was turned to blood. This made me realize why a new earth is needed, it's because God allowed the old earth to be completely screwed up during the apocalypse. It must have been easier to simply start from scratch that to fix the old one.

A nice new city, new Jerusalem, came down from heaven "prepared as a bride adorned for her husband" and God said his dwelling place is with man. He will be with them, he will wipe away every tear. Death, mourning, crying and pain will be no more, as these things have passed away.

Is this a description of heaven? No death indicates the immortality that we normally think of. And no pain, mourning or crying certainly fit well into my mental picture of heaven. And yet this somehow feels much different than the picture I have in my head, it seems much more physical maybe, I'm not sure. I always picture things being up in the clouds, could it be that my image of heaven is heavily influenced by lazy newspaper comic artists who want to get away with drawing clouds instead of landscapes?

Also, let's take a moment to look at the inherent sexism that is contained within the description of new Jerusalem. The bride being adorned for her husband sounds awfully like she's a commodity to me, being served up for his liking. Are we sure these are the people we want to take our morality from?

God says he will make all things new. He will give the thirsty the water of life without payment. For the one who conquers I will be his God and he will be my son.

It's funny to me that it says "without payment". There might be no money at this point in time, but getting here isn't free. If you were rich you had to get rid of all your stuff and sell it to the poor, if you lived through the apocalypse you had to not get the mark of the beast and forgo commerce for 3.5 years. There are countless other costs to get to this point. To say you are getting this water of life without payment is like saying the food on a cruise is free. Sure, I don't have to whip out my credit card at every meal, but I certainly pay for the food.

Not everyone will get this fate though, if you are among the following list, you will burn forever in the lake of fire and sulfur: cowardly, faithless, detestable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, liars.

If you take a close look at the list, the only really bad item is murder. Being a coward seems more of a problem for the person than for anyone else, certainly doesn't seem like a reason to burn someone for eternity. Being faithless is good. I'm not completely sure what detestable means, but I guess like being a coward, it seems like more of a personal problem than anything. As long as everyone consents sexuality is fine. Sorcerers and idolaters just show the time period this thing was written in. And finally liars, well if lying gets you thrown into the lake of fire then everyone will be in there together, because everyone lies from time to time.

The New Jerusalem (v. 9-27)

An angel took John to a high mountain where he could see new Jerusalem coming out of the sky. A ridiculous amount of detail is given about the city, including the fact that it is made of transparent gold. Also, the city was a cube, measuring about 1380 miles long, wide, and tall. The city gives off light, so it doesn't need the sun to shine on it.

It's funny, I was told as a child that in heaven the streets were made of gold. I haven't thought about it in a long time, but it was one of the earlier things set off my bullshit detector. I remember thinking it was obviously a simplified way you would tell a stupid person that heaven is great, but there is no way it would literally have streets made of gold. I always assumed it was some nonsense made up later by some Sunday school teacher who was having trouble communicating the majesty that heaven must really be. It's kinda funny to see it actually in the bible.

What lessons are contained in today's reading?

--Lists-- (I hate these stupid lists and never know how to categorize them)

Revelation 20:8 These things earn you hellfire

"But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death."

--Sexuality--

Revelation 20:2 Women are commodities

"And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband."

Revelation 20: Satan Tricks More People

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The Thousand Years (v. 1-6)

An angel came down from heaven, scooped up Satan, threw him in the bottomless pit and sealed it over so that he couldn't deceive the nations any longer...for a thousand years. After that he must be released "for a little while".

This is awesome. It seems to show that there is no permanent punishment. If the devil himself needs to get released after a while, you would think that your average sinner would not have to spend eternity in hell. This is obviously not what people think though, I wonder where that line of reasoning breaks down. [Note from later: permanent punishment is coming, there is just a strange 1000 year period of intermediate punishment before the permanent punishment...why?]

From Guzik

God could easily stop Satan’s activity at any time. Yet God allows Satan to continue, because even in his evil, he indirectly serves the purposes of God.

Once again, we see this point. And I agree with it completely, but where Guzik sees this as a good thing somehow, I just see it as a demonstration of what a monster God really is. He lets Satan do evil things to fit according to God's plan even though it causes problems for so many people. And it makes God ultimately responsible for everything Satan does.

Another point made is that this is a parallel of Jesus. Satan tried to imprison Jesus but he escaped in 3 days. On the other hand, Satan was imprisoned successfully for 1000 years.

Anyone who does not have the mark of the beast and instead followed God will be resurrected and reign with Jesus for a thousand years. This is the first resurrection. Everyone else will be resurrected at the end of the thousand years.

See, once again, eventually everyone gets resurrected. It would seem this also supports my previous point, no punishment is forever.

I guess one other thing I should mention here. I'm guessing they chose 1000 years because it sounds like it is so long it's basically forever. And yet it has been 2000 years an no apocalypse has happened yet. I just find that...interesting.

The Defeat of Satan (v. 7-10)

After a thousand years, Satan will be released from prison. He will deceive the nations of the 4 corners of the earth  and gather an army as numerous as the sand of the sea. They will surround the camp of the saints but fire will come down from heaven and consume them. Then the devil will be thrown into the lake of fire with the beast and the false prophet where they will be tormented day and night forever.

There we go. I thought that the beast was Satan, so him being thrown into the pit for a thousand years must have included him being released from the lake of fire, or alternatively, the lake of fire and the pit both really meant the same thing. But I was wrong there. Satan and the beast are different. Satan was thrown in the pit first for a while, then allowed to sucker a bunch of other people to die with him, THEN he was thrown into the lake of fire forever. So we clearly can't take this to mean that no punishment is forever, oh well.

I'd also like to highlight that Satan is being allowed to deceive a bunch of people and get them killed here. Why not just throw him into the lake of fire in the first place? Why does God let him screw over all of those people and get them killed? I'm guessing it's because they are evil anyway, so what's the difference! Screwed up logic.

There is a bunch of talk in the commentary about the message being contained in the fact that there is another battle. What does it mean? It demonstrates mans rebellious nature. It shows that deep down people will reject God if they aren't in his presence. It shows that even if the environment is great (god set up a world without the devil) the heart of man is really evil. So plenty of people who were born and raised in this time will still want to go to war with God. 

All of these explanations seem to miss the fact that they are being tricked. Verse 8 explicitly says that Satan deceived the armies to follow them. If they really wanted to rebel or whatever, then why was it necessary for Satan to trick them?

Judgment Before the Great White Throne (v. 11-15)

This looks like an angelic scene, but many
of these people are about to burn

All of the dead were gathered before the white throne. Many books were open, the dead were judged by what was written in the book and what they had done. Death and Hades ever gave up their dead, then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire, and anyone who wasn't in the book of life was also thrown into the lake of fire.

Presumably they were thrown into the lake of fire forever. It is interesting that Death an Hades are characters here, more evidence that Yahweh was just part of a pantheon? This is a story about how he came out the winner in the duel of Gods? Seems that way to me.

What lessons are in today's reading?

--Deception--

Revelation 20:7-9 Satan allowed to trick people and get them killed by God

"when the thousand years are ended, Satan will be released from his prison and will come out to deceive the nations that are at the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them for battle; their number is like the sand of the sea And they marched up over the broad plain of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city, but fire came down from heaven and consumed them,"

--Justice--

Revelation 20:15 Eternal punishment

"And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire."

Have You Been Harmed by the Church?

Note: this post is inspired by a recent post by Cephus about a challenge from a Christian.

It's not terribly uncommon to come across a religious person who thinks that I am an atheist because I have been harmed by the church in some way. They will often think I am an atheist because I am angry at God, because I have seen Christians do terrible things, because I think my entire childhood was somehow damaged because of the inclusion of the religion. They will then challenge me to put aside the painful emotions associated with these things and consider returning to God.

The thing is, there is some truth to the things they are saying here. I absolutely was harmed by the church in my childhood (luckily I didn't have to deal with molestation or physical abuse like so many people have to deal with, but let's just say telling a child they are evil to the core will give them some psychological problems). I have seen plenty of horrible things done in the name of God, I would even say that I am an atheist today because at some point in the past I had a very strong hatred for God. But it's not as simple as being angry and then suddenly being an atheist, it is the start of a long journey.

I was angry, very angry with God and religion in general. This anger led me to question everything and look for the truth of the matter to the best of my ability. I investigated the real source of my belief in God and thought about what would have happened if I had been born in a different part of the world, or at a different time. I looked for any proof of God I could get my hands on and tried to analyze if I thought they were worthwhile. I talked about these matters with as many people as I could. Ultimately I have concluded that there are no good reasons for believing in God. My own reasons for believing were all based on the fact that I had been told these things by everyone around me since birth, and the same was clearly true for all of them.

So back to the initial question, have I been harmed by the church? Absolutely! Am I an atheist because of that harm? Well yes, but probably not in the way you mean, it's not a simple connection. I was harmed and therefore motivated to seek the truth about religion, further, due to the anger I felt for the church, I was motivated to keep looking into things for about 10 years until I was satisfied that I had seen and rejected pretty much every argument out there.

In the Christian challenge linked at the top, he asked atheists to put aside their emotional baggage and look at the evidence. But for me, and many other atheists I've talked to, the emotional baggage is what motivated us to look at the evidence in the first place. Emotion played a big part in getting us started, but we have already answered this challenge on our own.

Phantom Limbs From Birth

I'm continuing my rereading of the book Phantoms in the Brain by Ramachandran. Today I'm reading chapter 3 "Chasing the phantom". I can't believe it has been so long since I read chapter 2, I had originally intended to read a chapter every other week.

The chapter starts out with Ramachandran talking to a woman (Mirabelle) who was born without arms who had phantom limbs. This is something that he had never seen before, and hadn't thought it was even possible. His idea, as we saw in the previous chapter, was that when we lose a limb there is some rewiring done in the brain to compensate and mistakes occurring during this process cause the phantom limbs. While this is surely going on, it can't be the whole story as it would not allow people to be born with phantom limbs.

In the previous chapter, we saw the Penfield homunculous which is a map of our body draped across the brain. There are a few of these maps in our brain working in concert, some developing in the womb and other developing later. If one of these maps is developed early enough, it would make sense that a person born without limbs would have phantom limbs, however, if other maps are developed later there might be some irregularities. In the case of this particular woman, her phantom arms gesticulate when she talks, and yet when she walks they hang at her sides, they don't swing. These 2 actions are controlled by different parts of the brain, which apparently develop at different times.

Something that is interesting here, is that Mirabelle was born with phantom limbs that she has some level of control over, and yet many people have phantom limbs that are paralyzed. In thinking about this, Ramachandran considered the way our brain processes moving our limbs. The motor command center of your brain sends out a message, say to lift your arm up, then information comes back through various channels. Direct messages from nerves and such, and also from your vision, and from your mental picture of your body. If these different signals conflict, the brain doesn't always reconcile them in the same way. If your body expects that your arm can move, that may be enough to override the other signals. This fits in with the fact that many people's phantom limbs become paralyzed as time goes on, and also that people who had their limb in a cast or otherwise incapacitated before it was amputated are much more likely to have paralyzed phantom limbs. To fix this problem, Ramachandran put a mirror in a box so that they could put their good arm in one side and their phantom limb in the other, and they would see the reflection as their phantom limb. In moving their good arm, they send a visual signal to their brain that the phantom limb is moving and they can regain movement.

Another experiment with the mirror box, they had the patient put on a glove and put their hand in the mirror box palm down. A grad student then put on an identical glove, hid under a curtain, and put their opposite hand in the mirror box palm up. To the patient, the grad student's hand looks like their hand. Now when the grad student touches their fingers to their palm, the patient sees their phantom fingers bending backwards touching the back of their hand in an impossible way. One patient said it felt like her finger was bending in an impossible way, but just that it was a curious sensation. Another patient said it was somewhat painful. The brain is certainly a complicated machine.

Here is a Ted talk by Ramachandran, the whole talk is great but the part about phantom limbs and the mirror box starts at about 9:30

He ends the chapter by suggesting that in actuality our entire bodies are phantoms in a sense that our brains build on the fly and he gives a few experiments that we can try at home (I am going to try this next time I have a few friends over). Sit in a chair and have friend 1 sit in another chair right in front of you (facing the same way as you) so that you can touch their nose. Close your eyes, then have friend 2 guide your finger to tap friend 1's nose in some kind of pattern (the more irregular the better), and at the same time friend 2 should tap your nose in an identical pattern. After 30 seconds or so, you should have the sensation that you are tapping your own nose, even though your hand is a few feet away from your face. You will either feel like your nose is separated from your face, or stretched out for several feet. Apparently this worked in about 50% of the people who tried it.

Revelation 19: Party in Heaven

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Rejoicing in Heaven (v. 1-5)

John heard a multitude of voices in heaven celebrating. They are happy that God is so just and powerful and killed the great prostitute because she corrupted the earth.

Again, the great prostitute seems to represent a city. Somehow this city encouraged people to stray from God, which is why it was represented as a prostitute. At least that is my takeaway here. It's hard to say exactly what this stuff is supposed to mean.


The Marriage Supper of the Lamb (v. 6-10)

The Lamb is getting married, his bride has readied herself and is clothed in fine linen, which are the righteous deeds of the saints. The angel said that those who are invited to the marriage are blessed by God, and John bowed down to worship him, but the angel said not to, because he was a servant as well.

What? This is apparently way over my head, hopefully the commentaries will be helpful here.

Apparently (according to Guzik), in the old testament Israel is often presented as God's wife, who is unfortunately often unfaithful.

The Rider on a White Horse (v. 11-21)

Then heaven opened up and a rider on a white horse came out who represents the word of God. His eyes are like fire, his head is covered in diadems, and he is clothed in a robe dipped in blood. Following are the armies of heaven clothed in fine linen.

Such a gruesome image of God.

An angel called to "all the birds overhead" (is this supposed to be the angels?) to gather for the great supper of God, to eat the flesh of kings, captains, mighty men, horses and their riders, all men free and slave.

Pic from The Living Word of God blog

What?

There was a great battle between the army of the beast and the army of heaven and obviously, heaven won. The beast was captured along with the prophet (who used signs to deceive people into following them) and threw them into the fire. The rest were slain by the sword.

Yet again, it is explicitly pointed out that people were tricked into following the beast, and yet those who followed are still punished.

What lessons were in this chapter?

--Free Will--

Revelation 19:20-21 Killed for being tricked into following the beast

"And the beast was captured, and with it the false prophet who in its presence had done the signs by which he deceived those who had received the mark of the beast and those who worshiped its image. These two were thrown alive into the lake of fire that burns with sulfur. And the rest were slain by the sword"

--Violence--

Revelation 19:20-21 Violent punishment

"These two were thrown alive into the lake of fire that burns with sulfur.  And the rest were slain by the sword"