Category Archives: General

The Ridiculous Argument from Accurate Names

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I attended a Bible archaeology seminar with a speaker who had worked on the excavation of the city of Sodom—or, at least that’s what they hoped. He argued a popular point, that biblical references validated by unbiased sources (such as archaeologists verifying that a Sodom actually existed) strengthen the Bible’s case as a historical document, and these natural claims help make the case for its supernatural claims.

Argument from Accurate Place Names

Here are additional examples of this popular argument.

Near Eastern archaeology has demonstrated the historical and geographical reliability of the Bible in many important areas. (Source: E.M. Blaiklock, The New International Dictionary of Biblical Archaeology)

Archeology and historical analysis again and again show the accuracy of the events, locations and customs mentioned in the Bible accounts. Never has anybody been able to disprove any of the accounts. (Source: Rob Vandeweghe, Windmill Ministries)

The Credo House blog adds the discovery of the town of Jericho and several inscriptions that confirm the existence of biblical characters: the Pilate Stone, the House of David inscription, and the Caiaphas Ossuary.

The Cold Case Christianity blog gives similar examples, including:

  • Luke 3:1 mentions Lysanias the tetrarch, and inscriptions have been found confirming this.
  • Acts 13:51 says that Iconium is in Phrygia, confirmed by an inscription.
  • John 5:1–9 mentions the pool of Bethesda, confirmed by archaeology.

Here’s a final example from The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus by Habermas and Licona:

In the past, the Bible has demonstrated that its accounts are trustworthy as far as they have been verified. Moreover, the Bible has never been controverted by solid historical data. Therefore, the benefit of the doubt should go to the Bible in places where it cannot be verified, when there is no evidence to the contrary, and when it seems clear that the author intended for us to understand the event as historical. (p. 31)

In short, the Bible refers to people and places that actually existed; therefore, the Bible is accurate and reliable.

Analysis

Let’s step back and see what we have here. These earnest Christian apologists would like us to believe that the Bible accurately recorded the existence of locations (Sodom, Jericho, Iconium, and the pool of Bethesda) and people (Pilate, David, Caiaphas, and Lysanias).

Okay. Is that it? This isn’t hard to accept.

Issue 1. Let me first cast just a bit of doubt on archaeological finds that are both ancient (which means that our conclusions must be tentative) and lucrative (collectors demand ancient artifacts that modern forgers are eager to provide). Some well-known Bible-era fakes are the James ossuary, the Jehoash inscription, and the ivory pomegranate of Solomon. That’s not to say that other finds are fakes but that we should be cautious.

Issue 2. Archaeology says that the Exodus didn’t happen. Does that un-convince you of anything? If not, why should the verified finds convince you?

If you’re impressed by the discovery of Sodom or Jericho, remember that Troy has also been discovered. Does that give support for the supernatural claims in the Iliad? The Iliad also mentions Perseus, the legendary founder of Mycenae, the ruins of which have also been found. Is this yet more support? Be consistent.

Issue 3. If you only want to say that the Bible makes some verified historical claims and so other as-yet-unverified natural claims should also be considered seriously, that’s fine. But surely these Christians want to go further. Surely they want this to support the Bible’s supernatural claims.

I’m happy to grant that the Bible makes many accurate historical references, but having accurate names of people and places merely gets you to the starting gate. It’s the bare minimum that we demand of a historical document. You haven’t supported the supernatural claims; you’ve simply avoided getting cut from the list of entrants being considered.

Instead of focusing on the Bible’s accurate but mundane statements, show us one thing that we thought was natural but is actually supernatural. After that point, the Bible’s supernatural claims won’t seem so surprising. A pile of validated natural claims gets you nowhere in supporting supernatural claims.

Christian apologists tell us, “The Bible isn’t inaccurate in some of its testable claims!” That this counts as a apologetic says a lot for what passes for compelling argument in some Christian circles.

It is useless to attempt to reason a man
out of a thing he was never reasoned into.
— Jonathan Swift

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(This is an update of a post that originally appeared 9/22/14.)

Image via marinnemo, CC license

 

The Hypothetical God Fallacy

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Christian apologist Mikel Del Rosario raised three hard-hitting points (and by “hard-hitting,” I mean “childish”). I want to examine them to show what passes for good apologetics. Read part 1 of my response here.

Let’s wrap up the response to his point #2.

Point 2. The Problem of Evil Doesn’t Mean There’s No God

The Christian worldview gives us another option that atheists often leave out of the equation. . . . God can have good reasons for allowing evil—even if we don’t know what those reasons are.

This error is so common that it needs a name, so I’ll name it: the Hypothetical God Fallacy. Sure, if we presuppose an omniscient God, this gets us out of every possible jam in which God looks bad. Haiti tsunami? God could’ve had good reasons. A young mother, beloved in her community, dies suddenly and leaves behind a husband and three children? A result of God’s good reasons. Genocide demanded and slavery accepted in the Old Testament? World War? Plane crash? Missing keys?

God.

This short article is peppered with this comforting yet ludicrous fallacy:

If God is good and evil exists . . .

The mere fact that I can’t figure out why God allows some of the things to happen that he does . . . is not warrant for the conclusion that he’s got no such reasons.

It actually takes some humility to admit the role of human finiteness in understanding why God allows evil.

Just because something might seem pointless to us, doesn’t mean God can’t have a morally justified reason for it.

I hope that, as you see more examples of this, it becomes like fingernails on a blackboard.

Yes, bad things in the world don’t force the conclusion that God can’t exist. Fortunately, I don’t draw such a conclusion. And yes, if God exists, he could have his reasons for things that we don’t understand.

The Hypothetical God Fallacy is a fallacy because no one interested in the truth starts with a conclusion (God exists) and then arranges the facts to support that conclusion. That’s backwards; it’s circular reasoning. Rather, the truth seeker starts with the facts and then follows them to their conclusion. (More here.)

If God exists, he could have terrific reasons for why there’s so much gratuitous evil in the world. The same could be true for the Invisible Pink Unicorn (glitter be upon Him). Neither approach does anything to support a belief chosen beforehand.

Point 3. The Problem of Evil Isn’t Just a Christian Problem

The Problem of Evil isn’t just a Christian problem. Evil is everybody’s problem!

Then you don’t know what the Problem of Evil is, because it is precisely just a Christian problem. The Problem of Evil asks, how can a good God allow all the gratuitous evil we see in our world? Drop the God presupposition, and the problem goes away.

You could ask the different question, how does an atheist explain the bad in the world? Quick answer: shit happens. Some is bad luck (mechanical problem causes a car accident), some is natural (flood), some is caused by other people (jerky coworker badmouths you to the boss and you don’t get the promotion), and some is caused by you (you should’ve gotten the flood insurance). Adding God to the equation explains nothing and introduces the Problem of Evil so that you’re worse off than when you started.

Del Rosario again:

If atheism is true, there’s no basis for objective moral values and duties.

Sounds right, but why imagine that objective moral values exist? What many apologists perceive as objective moral values are actually just shared moral values. That we share moral values isn’t too surprising since we’re all the same species. Nothing supernatural is required. (More here.)

Del Rosario stumbles over another issue with morality.

You couldn’t have any kind of real, moral grounding to call it objectively evil—if atheism is true.

He’s using “real” to mean ultimate or objective. And here again, the ball’s in his court to convince us of his remarkable claim that objective morality exists and that everyone can access it. (Suggestion: find a resolution to the abortion problem that is universally acceptable. If there’s not a single correct resolution then it’s not an objective moral truth, and if we can’t reliably access it, then it’s useless.)

As for the ordinary, everyday sort of moral grounding, the kind that both Christians and atheists use, you’ll find that in the dictionary. Look up “morality,” and you’ll read nothing about objective grounding.

We have one final challenge:

The atheist position’s got another problem to deal with: The Problem of Good. In other words, naturalism has the challenge of providing a sufficient moral grounding for goodness itself—in addition to making sense of evil in the world. And that’s a pretty tall order for a philosophy with absolutely no room for God.

What’s difficult? We’re good because of evolution. We’re social animals, like wolves and chimpanzees, so we have cooperative traits like honesty, cooperation, sympathy, trustworthiness, and so on.

The God hypothesis adds nothing to the conversation, and we must watch out for it being smuggled in as a presupposition (the Hypothetical God Fallacy). And we’re back where we started from, wondering where the good Christian arguments are.

You don’t need religion to have morals.
If you can’t determine right from wrong
then you lack empathy, not religion.
(seen on the internet)

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(This is an update of a post that originally appeared 9/8/14.)

Photo credit: Wikipedia

 

Where Are the Good Christian Arguments? (The Problem of Evil Isn’t One.)

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Let me begin by admitting that, like most people, my sense of the best arguments in any field is limited. There is only so much time to listen to podcasts and read books and blogs. I try to stay up to date on what passes for compelling arguments in Christian apologetics, but I’m sure I’m missing some good stuff.

Two kinds of apologetics

Nevertheless, the Christian arguments that I come across seem to be of two sorts. One category is the earnest statement of a weak argument. I’ll provide an example shortly. The second is the deep and convoluted “No, I can’t make this any simpler” philosophical argument.

I’ve tackled a few of the philosophical arguments (see the list at the end). I haven’t found any that are compelling, but one of the fallbacks for the apologist with this kind of argument is to say that I’ve only responded to some of the variants of that argument. They’ll point to a stack of books and demand that I respond to all the new ’n improved versions, despite the fact that even within the philosophical community these arguments aren’t widely accepted. Only the most popular interest me, because a boring, convoluted, esoteric argument doesn’t make for an interesting blog post.

The biggest obstacle for me is the idea that a loving god who desires a relationship with humanity would make his presence known only with these vague and esoteric arguments.

Does a God exist who desires us to know him? He’d make himself known.

Christian slapdown of the Problem of Evil

What prompted this post was an article by Mikel Del Rosario, the “Apologetics Guy.” He says that he’s a Christian apologetics professor, speaker, and trainer. He has an MA in Christian Apologetics from Biola and a Master of Theology at Dallas Theological Seminary, so you’d expect a substantial argument.

You’d expect wrong.

I come across articles like this frequently. I’m eager to respond, but there’s just not that much to say. Either the points that come to mind are already out there in a few of my posts or I can deal with it in just a paragraph. My response becomes nothing more than a comment, not a blog post. Take a look at the argument, and you may see what I mean.

Del Rosario raises three points.

1. The Problem of Evil Isn’t An Argument for Atheism

Del Rosario says,

[The Problem of Evil] really isn’t an argument for atheism. It’s not even a challenge to the existence of God.

(The Problem of Evil states that a good god wouldn’t allow the evil we see to exist, but since evil does exist, the Christian god can’t exist.)

He supports this claim by quoting atheist Sam Harris: “If God exists, either he can do nothing to stop the most egregious calamities, or he does not care to. God, therefore, is either impotent or evil.”

If I may paraphrase Del Rosario’s response, he says, “Aha! You said, ‘If God exists’! If God exists, then you lose, Mr. Atheist.”

No, Harris doesn’t think that the Christian god exists; he’s simply arguing that evidence shows that any god in charge is impotent or evil, which conflicts with the Christian claims of omnipotence and omni-benevolence. Conclusion: the Christian god doesn’t exist.

If Del Rosario wants to accept Harris’s hypothetical, I don’t think it takes him where he wants to go, so this word game fails.

Del Rosario continues:

But some still insist that all the evil and suffering in the world, especially the stuff that seems totally pointless to us, must mean there’s no God.

No, I don’t conclude that there is no God, but that’s where the evidence points. And that’s enough.

2. The Problem of Evil Doesn’t Mean There’s No God

Del Rosario gives the example of a child’s pain and fear during a medical procedure. The adults understand the importance of the procedure, but they can do nothing beyond supporting the child through it. The problem with this popular analogy, of course, is that the adults are limited while God isn’t. If God wanted to help a child with a medical issue, it could be done immediately and painlessly. If God wanted to terraform Indonesia, he could find a dozen ways to do it without the 2004 tsunami and without inconveniencing a single person. That he doesn’t is just more evidence that he doesn’t exist.

Dr. Glenn Kreider said, “If God is good and evil exists, then God will one day do something about evil and . . . we have an eschatological [end times] hope that evil and all of its effects will one day be removed. So there is a redemptive work of God and he is acting redemptively in a fallen world.

So there are problems in the world, and God will address them in his own sweet time? I await the evidence for this incredible claim. No, I won’t just accept that on faith.

The atheist view sounds far more responsible: some problems in this world we can fix, and some we can’t. Let’s not wait for some supernatural something-or-other without any obvious existence to pick up the pieces. Rather, let’s join together to make the most progress we can.

Concluded here.

Appendix

Here are a few of the posts I’ve written that respond to philosophical apologetics.

Rational arguments don’t usually work on religious people.
Otherwise there would be no religious people.
— Dr. House in House (season 4, episode 2)

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(This is an update of a post that originally appeared 9/3/14.)

Image via Forsaken Fotos, CC license

C.S. Lewis: Put Up or Shut Up

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The influence of C. S. Lewis on modern Christians in the West is hard to overestimate. Few stories of apologists coming to faith don’t include a mention of Lewis’s Mere Christianity.

Lewis was a student of Norse, Greek, and Irish mythology since his youth. He knew mythology and, he felt, knew reality by contrast. Here’s his critique of the overall feel of Christianity as he compares it to the two possibilities, myth and reality.

Reality, in fact, is usually something you could not have guessed. That is one of the reasons I believe Christianity. It is a religion you could not have guessed. If it offered us just the kind of universe we had always expected, I should feel we were making it up. But, in fact, it is not the sort of thing anyone would have made up. It has just that queer twist about it that real things have. So let us leave behind all these boys’ philosophies—these over simple answers. The problem is not simple and the answer is not going to be simple either.

Simple as a test for religion

Lewis is making several points here, one that simplicity isn’t what we should expect to find in Christianity. Lewis says earlier in the book, “It is no good asking for a simple religion. After all, real things are not simple.”

While it’s true that natural things are often messy and complicated, a supernatural God could answer, clearly and unambiguously, the big issues Christians fight over in a single page.

Christianity has much to be confused about. Look at the long list of Christian heresies about the nature of Jesus, the role of Mary, and so on. These have been resolved by mandate and tradition, not by objective evidence. Look at modern debates over morality (same-sex marriage, abortion, euthanasia). Look at the second coming, the Trinity, justification for God’s abominable actions in the Old Testament, and other murky issues. Look at the 45,000 denominations of Christianity that exist today. When Christianity can get its act together, get back to me.

No, complex is just what made-up religions look like. Religions, especially the old ones, are usually quite complicated. Simple is a reasonable thing to ask for.

Queer? That can be tested, too.

Let’s return to the point that I think is more interesting. Lewis said, “[Christianity] has just that queer twist about it that real things have.” It’s an instinctive reaction, so let’s label this argument Lewis’s Appeal to the Gut. Christianity just feels like reality rather than myth.

Let’s pursue this. Lewis says that myth feels one way, and reality feels another way. All right, Clive—formalize and quantify this “queer twist.” Give us an algorithm for reliably telling myth and reality apart in a document. Does it have to do with passive vs. active voice? Is it dynamic vs. passive action? Male vs. female characters? A direct storyline vs. one with tangents? Word choice or subject matter or archaic language or sentence length? Turn this feeling into something that can be tested.

Challenge 1. Let’s take this powerful tool on the road. Test your algorithm on biographies, hagiographies (a biography written to flatter), legend, mythology, and so on. See if it accurately separates Myth and Reality.

Challenge 2. See how it does with religious writings. Does it put the Bible (and only the Bible) into the Reality bin?

Challenge 3. Now use your algorithm to invent a supernatural story that has the traits of Reality. This is a supernatural story that you know is false (because you made it up), and yet you are compelled by your genre argument to declare it true (because that’s how you know Christianity is true). You’re obliged to believe this story as strongly as Christianity by your own argument.

But if you reject this invented story, you’ll need to reject your test as well. Maybe “if the genre feels right, then the story is believable” isn’t so useful after all.

Lewis has company

Early church father Tertullian (died ca. 240) said about the resurrection, “it is wholly believable because it is absurd.” The New Testament says, “For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God” (1 Corinthians 1:18).

That’s right—it is both foolish and absurd, but that’s not something to celebrate.

That’s not how the adults do it

Instead of the feel test, may I suggest that we follow the lead of the experts? We already have a scholarly discipline devoted to deciding what happened in the past. It’s called History. It uses principles shaped over centuries that do a good job of synthesizing what actually happened from what is invariably insufficient or contradictory evidence. Spoiler: history is no friend of the supernatural. The consensus view of historians scrubs the supernatural from the record.

The resurrection, the Trinity, hell—there’s plenty of nonsense within Christian dogma that has just that queer twist about it that legend has. Only by inverting Lewis’s argument does it make sense.

For more rebuttals to nonsense from C. S. Lewis, check out these posts:

When we remove all the unevidenced beliefs
[from supernatural thinking]
we are left with naturalism.
And when we remove all the unevidenced beliefs
from naturalism,
we are left with naturalism.
— commenter Greg G.

Image via KMW2700, CC license

More Sloppy Thinking from William Lane Craig

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In a recent post, I explored William Lane Craig’s unhealthy relationship with facts and evidence. Given his two doctorates and his frequent debates, you’d think that he’d be the champion of reason. Not so.

It is the self-authenticating witness of the Holy Spirit that gives us the fundamental knowledge of Christianity’s truth. Therefore, the only role left for argument and evidence to play is a subsidiary role. (Reasonable Faith, Third Edition, 47)

There’s a lot of that going around. Craig is like Jonathan Wells, a fellow at the Discovery Institute, who earned a doctorate in molecular and cell biology. Wells also sees science as the cabin boy to his agenda: “[The words of my spiritual leader Rev. Sun Myung Moon], my studies, and my prayers convinced me that I should devote my life to destroying Darwinism.”

And what is the “self-authenticating” part of the witness of the Holy Spirit? Craig needs to show his work. This sounds like nothing more than permission to elevate a personal opinion to a dictate of the Holy Spirit.

Is what’s good for the goose good for the gander?

Craig argues that God’s existence is obvious and needn’t be justified. Coming to grips with that remarkable attitude was the topic of my earlier post. Let’s explore further the dark and tangled recesses of the thinking within Craig’s Reasonable Faith.

Craig anticipates the obvious rebuttal. If the Christian is justified in dismissing evidence and argument and instead says the witness of the Holy Spirit is sufficient—indeed, superior—justification for their belief, why can’t the guy from the other religion do the same? Craig observes, “Christian claims to a subjective experience seem to be on a par with similar non-Christian claims.”

It sounds like we see the problem the same way, but here is Craig’s bizarre reply.

How is the fact that other persons [sic] claim to experience a self-authenticating witness of God’s Spirit relevant to my knowing the truth of Christianity via the Spirit’s witness? The existence of an authentic and unique witness of the Spirit does not exclude the existence of false claims to such a witness…. Why should I be robbed of my joy and assurance of salvation simply because someone else falsely pretends, sincerely or insincerely, to the Spirit’s witness? (Reasonable Faith, 49)

Craig once again vomits onto thoughtful discourse. He ignores the problem, assumes that he is right, and then shapes the facts to fit.

Some other guy says that his beliefs are actually correct? No problem—just assume the guy is mistaken and, like magic, Craig’s presupposition of correctness is validated.

Objection 2

The mental masturbation continues. Given that the other guy is wrong, Craig asks why the Christian couldn’t also be wrong.

We’re gently scolded for asking this, because this has already been addressed:

The experience of the Spirit’s witness is self-authenticating for him who really has it.

Once again, Craig wants to start with the fact that the Christian is correct, and shape everything to fit.

The hole in Craig’s approach is that he gives no reliable way to determine “him who really has [the Spirit’s witness].” Or, for that matter, any reason to think that the Spirit actually exists.

Mother Teresa famously agonized over this question. She had powerful spiritual experiences as a young woman, but then she felt them no longer. Craig’s approach could have offered her nothing.

Objection 3

If human thinking is fallible, as we’ve seen in the Mormon or Muslim who are wrong in thinking that they have an authentic spiritual experience, maybe Christians should also hesitate to trust their own thinking when it declares that their experience is authentic.

Craig responds by denying that there is any parallel between the Christian and the non-Christian. The Mormon or Hindu thinks that his experience is indistinguishable in character from the Christian’s? They’re simply wrong.

Put reason in its place

Craig raises more hypothetical objections to spiritual belief justified by reason rather than by the witness of the Holy Spirit. If we demanded good reasons, he says, “[that] would consign most Christians [who haven’t developed good reasons] to irrationality.”

Yes, he really said that. It’d be a pain to have to, y’know, do all that research and stuff. I mean, who’s got the time? Using reason would be inconvenient, so let’s not.

Craig brings insight to another issue:

According to the magisterial role of reason [that is, putting reason in charge], these persons [evaluating Christianity’s claims] should not have believed in Christ until they finished their apologetic.

Well, yeah. You usually don’t accept a claim—especially one as remarkable as the Christian one—without good evidence. Do you expect rational people to apologize for that?

And we’re back to the symmetry with the position of the guy from the other religion. Do you want to give him this excuse? Should, “believe first, justify later” be a position that you respect for the non-Christian as well as the Christian?

Craig next imagines someone justifying their life in front of God. If reasonable arguments for belief were mandatory, then nonbelievers could argue that they simply hadn’t been given sufficiently strong arguments. But we can’t have that since the Bible says that “men are without excuse.”

Follow the drunken reasoning: we start with the correctness of the Bible; so when it says that there is no excuse, it must be correct; so there is no justification for nonbelief, including insufficient reasons; so reasons must not be mandatory. See how that works? Again, Craig tells us that relying on reason would be inconvenient, so let’s not.

William Lane Craig is a professor of philosophy at Talbot School of Theology. I wonder what standards he imposes on his students. Would he accept this kind of “thinking” from his students? That evidence and reason are subordinate to the students’ internal, nonverifiable conviction? How would you grade a paper if it was supported with earnest conviction instead of evidence, and reason couldn’t be used to evaluate it?

So much for apologetics to raise the intellectual content of the conversation.

If Christianity doesn’t seem true to you, [C.S. Lewis] says,
then by all means reject it!
But once you are in,
you are no longer responsible to weigh all things.
Indeed, you are responsible not to!
— Robert M. Price, “The Sin of Faith”

(This is an update of a post that originally appeared 7/21/14.)
Image via Daniel Stark, CC license

 

A Response to Pascal’s Wager (Fiction)

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After more than 1000 posts at this blog, I’d like to return to the project that started it all, my 2012 book, Cross Examined: An Unconventional Spiritual Journey. I’ll run a few excerpts from the book over the next couple of months. These may run a bit longer than the usual post, but the fiction format is an interesting way to explore apologetics arguments.

A bit of background: Jim is a wealthy, housebound, and somewhat obnoxious atheist, and Paul is the young acolyte of a famous pastor, doing his best to evangelize. It’s 1906 in Los Angeles, and they’re in Jim’s study. Jim is working on an electric fan.

Paul cleared his throat and began. “Okay, I’m sure you’ll agree that you possess only a tiny fraction of all knowledge.”

“Of course.”

“Then isn’t it possible that there is compelling evidence that God exists, but you just don’t know it? Doesn’t this throw great doubt on your belief that God doesn’t exist?”

“Great doubt? Hardly,” Jim said as he strung the power cord through the fan’s base. “I’m also not certain that leprechauns don’t exist. No good evidence argues that they do exist, so I assume they don’t. By this logic, I also think God doesn’t exist. Give me the information that would convince me otherwise. If he exists, that fact is apparently not well publicized or not convincing.”

“Evidence for God’s existence is both well publicized and convincing,” Paul said. “The Bible tells us, ‘Since the creation of the world, God’s invisible qualities have been clearly seen, so that men are without excuse.’ ”

“How can his invisible qualities be seen?”

“What I mean is, the majority of your fellow citizens believe in God.”

“And the majority of people don’t. The preponderance of evidence says that there is no God, so that’s what I believe. That’s what I must believe. If I stumbled across new information that showed my position was wrong, I should indeed change it.”

Jim mounted the motor on its base. “You raise a dangerous challenge. Turn it around: given the tiny fraction of all knowledge that you possess, how can you reject the hundreds of belief systems that exist today and have existed through history? Aren’t you concerned about being a bad Muslim? You don’t want to spend eternity in Muslim hell. Or a bad Buddhist? I’ve seen pictures of the hell of Tibetan Buddhism, and you don’t want to go there either.

“We’re both atheists. We agree that the thousands of gods in history are fiction, with the single exception of the Christian god—you think that particular god, out of all the others, actually exists. I rejected the Christian god with much more deliberation than you used when you rejected all the others. If you think that I’m obliged to consider Christianity’s claims, surely you’re obliged to consider the claims of the other religions.”

Paul said, “I consult my feelings and know the Christian path to be the true one. Faith is believing what you know in your heart to be true.”

“That’s something a believer from any tradition could say. What religion would you claim if you grew up in Egypt or Morocco or the Ottoman Empire? If you were of a spiritual bent, you would almost surely be a Muslim. You’d be a Hindu if raised in certain parts of India, a Confucian in China, and so on. Were you just extraordinarily lucky to have been born in a place and time in which the correct religion happened to be dominant?”

Jim poked his screwdriver toward Paul. “Why are you a Christian? Not because Christianity is the truth. It’s simply because you were raised in a Christian community. It’s the same with language—you speak English because you were born in America. You didn’t evaluate the world’s languages and rationally decide which one to speak—it was a decision made for you by society. You’re simply a product of your culture.”

Paul squeezed his hands into a fist so hard that he could feel his fingernails digging into his palms. “Then how do you explain the hundreds of millions of Christians? Christianity is the most popular religion the world has ever seen.”

“Truth is not a goddamn popularity contest.” Jim slashed with the screwdriver to punctuate his words like a manic orchestra conductor. “Some religion will be the most popular—does that make it the correct one? And how do you explain the hundreds of millions of Muslims? Or Hindus? Or any of the other religions that have been around for centuries and seem to satisfy the spiritual needs of their adherents? Is it delusion? Superstition? Custom? Indoctrination? However you explain the success of those religions should answer your question about why Christians believe. Look at the new variants of Christianity that have sprouted in this country in just the last century—Mormonism, Christian Science, Seventh-day Adventists, Jehovah’s Witnesses. Why is your flavor of Christianity not invented just like these were?”

Sweat tickled Paul’s skin as it ran down his sides. He couldn’t control this slippery conversation. Now would be a good time to help, God, he thought as he launched into Samuel’s approach to Pascal’s Wager.

“All right, let’s think of this like a bet,” he began, “the most important bet imaginable. Suppose your concerns are correct and there were just one chance in a hundred that Christianity is correct. Let’s suppose the time, energy, and money you would invest in the church amounts to ten thousand dollars over your lifetime. For it to be an even bet, the return on a win—Christianity being true—must be a hundred times your expense, or a million dollars. That is, you wager ten thousand dollars for a one-in-a-hundred chance to win a million dollars. Would you say that that’s a fair bet?”

“Yes, that’s a fair bet,” Jim said, smiling.

“But wouldn’t you also say that the prize of eternal bliss instead of torment is much more valuable than a million dollars? Doesn’t that make betting on Christianity the obvious choice?”

“Sam and I came up with that argument on our own. We were quite pleased with ourselves—only later did I discover that Pascal had beaten us by 250 years.” Jim wiped his hands with a rag as he stood and walked to the bureau holding the chessboard. “I don’t know about Sam, but I’ve thought quite a bit about these arguments over the years. What seemed very compelling to us long ago has a lot of holes under close examination. If all you’ve got is Sam’s arguments from twenty-five years ago, then I’m afraid he hasn’t armed you very well.” He pulled open a wide drawer, poked through its clutter for a few moments, and returned to the sofa with a deck of cards. The low table in front of the sofa held several open books, which Jim closed and dropped with a thump on the blue and white Oriental rug.

“Since we’re talking about betting, let’s simulate your argument with cards,” Jim said, as he held the cards face down in one hand and fanned them with the other. “What card shall we use to represent the Christian jackpot?”

Paul groped for a symbol, and the image of the princess mother from the fairy tale came to mind. “How about … the queen of hearts.”

“Okay, and let’s improve your odds. Let’s say that you must pay just a thousand dollars for the privilege of picking a card, but if you pick the queen of hearts, you get a million dollars. That’s about what you’re saying, right?”

“Sure.”

“But is that really analogous to our situation?” Jim turned the cards over and leafed through them until he found the queen of hearts. He put that card face up on the sofa beside him and fanned the remaining cards as before, offering them face down to Paul. “How about now? Would you pay a thousand dollars to play now?”

“Of course not,” Paul said. “There’s no chance of winning.”

“Right. So which game are we playing—the one with the winning card in the pack or the one with no winning card?” Jim looked at Paul for a moment before slapping the cards onto the table. “There’s no winning card here! Show me why that’s not completely analogous to your wager. If you said that you worshipped the sun, at least I could know that what you worshipped actually existed. And this wager applies to you as well. You can’t offer this wager to me without making a similar bet yourself with a thousand other religions.”

Jim returned to sit on the floor in front of the fan and pushed the blades onto the motor shaft. “Another thing: I can’t choose to believe. I won’t pretend to believe either—I don’t respect hypocrisy, and if God exists, he doesn’t either. I can’t choose to believe in God or Jesus just like you can’t choose to believe in Zeus or Hercules. Christians seem to imagine faith in Jesus like a plate of sandwiches passed around at supper—I can take or not as I choose. But belief doesn’t work that way, so don’t imagine that your religion has provided eternal salvation for the taking.”

“But what if I’m right?” Paul asked.

“And what if I’m right? Then you will have missed seeing your life for what it truly is—not a test to see if you correctly dance to the tune of an empty set of traditions; not a shell of a life, with real life waiting for you in the hereafter; not drudgery to be endured or penance paid while you bide your time for your reward. But rather the one chance you have at reality. We can argue about whether heaven exists, but one thing we do know is that we get one life here on earth. A too-short life, no matter how long you live, that you can spend wisely or foolishly. Where you can walk in a meadow on a warm spring day, and laugh and learn, and do good things and feel good for having done them. Where you can strive to leave the world a little better than you found it. Where you can play with children, and teach someone, and love.”

Jim gestured with increasing vigor until he sprang from the floor and paced like a preacher, looking at Paul as he did so. “There’s simply no reason to imagine that there’s a beneficent Father in the sky to lean on, to take care of us, to clean up our mistakes—the evidence says that we’re on our own. That reality can be sobering, but it’s also empowering. We’re the caretakers of the world, and if we blunder, we pay the price. But if we create a better world, then we and our descendants get to enjoy it. This is no hollow philosophy. It’s joyous and empowering—and it’s reality. I would rather live in reality than in a delusion, no matter how delightful. I don’t want my mind clouded by superstition just like I don’t want it clouded by opium. And making the most of today is better than living for an imaginary tomorrow in heaven.” Jim stared at him with his hands on his hips.

“Well …” Paul stared at his note card, looking for his next move. “Well, let me ask you this: what would you say if you died and found yourself standing in judgment before God?”

“I would say that I followed reason, not faith,” Jim said as he walked back to the towel and set the brass cage in place around the blades. “That I didn’t allow superstition to govern me and saw no sin in being intellectually honest. That I tried to lead an ethical life driven solely by my love of my fellow man, not by fear of punishment or desire for reward in the afterlife. And what about you? If there is a God, maybe he will say to you, ‘You had no evidence to believe and yet you did. Is that what I gave you brains for—to follow the crowd? You had a powerful tool that you didn’t use. I gave you brains for you to think.’ ”

Jim set the rebuilt fan on the floor next to the bureau. He plugged it in and the blades swung into motion with a hum, sending a cool breeze across the room.

“Remember the story of Jack and the Beanstalk?” Jim asked as he returned to the sofa, wiping his hands. “Jack sells the family cow for five magic beans. His mother throws out the beans and scolds the boy. But the next day they find an enormous beanstalk. Jack climbs up, finds an evil giant, takes all his treasure, and kills him—a happy ending.”

He threw the rag onto the center table. “But is this good advice? Should we all be like Jack? Would you recommend that someone trade his most valuable possession for some magical something, with no proof?”

“But look at what happened,” Paul said. “Jack made the bet and won. He took the leap of faith, and things worked out well for him.”

“It’s a story! It’s just pretend. Is Christianity compelling in the same way—because it’s also a story?” Jim jabbed his finger in the air to punctuate his words. “You should not … take your life lessons … from a fairy tale. You should not trade a cow for ‘magic’ beans, and you shouldn’t trade away your most valuable possession, your life, on a mythical claim without evidence.”

“My life isn’t my most valuable possession—my soul is.”

“Show me that your soul is any more real than magic beans and I’ll see your point.”

(This is an update of a post that originally appeared 6/30/14.)