Review of Sarah Palin’s “Good Tidings and Great Joy”: the Good

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Sarah Palin’s Christmas bookNo, I’m not part of the target audience for Sarah Palin’s new book, but I was given a copy to review. Good Tidings and Great Joy: Protecting the Heart of Christmas is a fairly predictable mix of the joys of the traditional American Christmas, an attack on those angry atheists who are apparently determined to make Christianity illegal (starting with Christmas), and a review of the standard conservative touch points.
Let’s take a look at the good, the bad, and the ugly in this book. First, the good. Despite Palin’s eagerness to play the beleaguered Christian, I was not surprised to find important areas where we agree. It’s a War-on-Christmas miracle!
Christmas in Alaska
Most chapters begin with long reflections of Palin’s childhood and adult family life. She includes personal photos and emphasizes the importance of family Christmas traditions by talking about her own. She shares stories of personal difficulties and Christmas memories—a health scare with her father, her daughter Brisol’s revelation that she was pregnant, helping to feed homeless people, difficulties during and after her Vice Presidential bid, and so on. Some favorite Christmas recipes are added in an appendix.
Stories about growing up in Alaska were nice—there’s a lot different from my own upbringing in Virginia—but I did experience a bit of whiplash. She goes on at length about the traditional Norman Rockwell Christmas traditions—sipping hot chocolate by the fire, the unwritten rules about opening presents, and so on. That sounds like what I value about Christmas as well. But then she discards all this like used wrapping paper to emphasize the real reason for the season.

Our annual family activities I’ve described are mere traditions …. But they’d be nothing if separated from the historical event that animates the Christmas season. (8)
Gifts can’t really bring ultimate joy (91)
If I’m for Christmas, it’s only because I’m for Christ. (9)
It’s about Christ and our ability to worship him freely. It’s about America, and what liberty truly means in our day-to-day lives. (10)

I also value America, liberty, and religious freedom. You can’t worship who you want? Then I’m as outraged as you are. Here we see a bit of the War on Christmas theme, but more on that later.
Living with a secular constitution
After listing many recent examples of church/state friction—protests against nativity scenes in front of city hall, for example—she gives a brief list of rules for how we can all get along. She recommends avoiding a Christian-only display.

The courts tend not to like Nativity scenes isolated from other holiday imagery. (53)

The “other holiday imagery” seems to be Santa Claus and snowmen rather than a clear public pronouncement that all faiths are welcome, as courts have demanded. Still, it’s a start.
But what if I’m offended?
She makes a point with which I strongly agree:

Traditionally, … Americans don’t have a right to not be offended (23)

That sentiment is common among American atheists. In fact, I bet that it’s predominant. Citizens have many important rights, but not being offended isn’t one of them.
Are atheists allergic to Christmas?
Want to see a photo of Richard Dawkins with his Christmas tree? Check out the Atheists for Christmas web site. Dawkins is at least one prominent atheist who finds secular value in a holiday that is currently the most popular in a long line of winter holidays.
The site claims, “There are just as many Christians that don’t celebrate Christmas (i.e. Jehovah’s Witnesses, certain Protestant sects) as there are non-Christians that don’t.” Celebrating Christmas is a recent tradition. It was outlawed by the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1659.
Western culture is built on sometimes-forgotten references to gods. Christmas 2013 will be on a Wednesday, but the name Wednesday also honors a god. “Wednesday” means “Woden’s Day,” and Woden is the English form of Odin, the Norse supreme god. In Romance languages, that day is typically “Mercury’s Day” (mercredi in French and miércoles in Spanish, for example).
The same supernatural connection applies to the year 2013, which counts as its year one an approximation of the birth year of Jesus.
Sure, Christmas was deliberately placed on the calendar to usurp other winter holidays such as Yule, Saturnalia, Brumalia, and any other solstice celebration. And Americans celebrate other December holidays such as Kwanzaa, Pancha Ganapati, and Hanukkah. But if atheists have no problem with Wednesday (which acknowledges Odin) and 2013 (which acknowledges Jesus), why not Christmas?
Palin’s “Good Tidings and Great Joy” isn’t all good. Continue with the Bad.

Do not learn the ways of the nations. …
For the customs of the peoples are worthless;
they cut a tree out of the forest,
and a craftsman shapes it with his chisel.
They adorn it with silver and gold. …
Like a scarecrow in a melon patch, their idols cannot speak. …
Do not fear them; they can do no harm nor can they do any good.
— Jeremiah 10:2–5

Jesus and Santa: a Parable on How We Dismiss Evidence

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Santa and Jesus: two mythsHarriett Hall (the SkepDoc) wrote a clever story about two kids trying to figure out whether the tooth fairy really exists or not. Inspired by that, and in keeping with the season, I’d like to imagine two kids arguing about Santa.
It was early December, and little Jerry had begun to doubt the existence of Santa Claus. He made his case to his younger brother Scott.
“I don’t think Santa is real. I think it’s just Mom and Dad buying us presents,” Jerry said.
“Prove it,” Scott said.
“Okay, why are there all those Santas on the street corners ringing for money? How can Santa be at all those stores at once?”
“They’re not the real Santa, just his helpers,” Scott said. “And maybe they’re just testing us to see if we’ll still believe. I’m going to believe, because if you don’t, you don’t get presents.”
“But I recognized one of them—it was the father of one of my friends.”
“Then those are just ordinary people imitating Santa, raising money for a good cause. Anyway, I’ve seen Santa on TV at Thanksgiving—everyone has.”
Jerry sees that he’s not making any progress, so he gives up. On Christmas afternoon, he’s alone with Scott and tries again. “Remember that video game that you told Mom about and then you forgot to tell Santa?” Jerry said. “But you got it anyway. Mom must’ve bought it and written on the package that it came from Santa.” 
“Mom just told Santa,” Scott said. 
“Then tell me this: how can Santa get around the world in one night?”
“My friends all say that Santa is real. Anyway, Santa has magic. And the cookies we leave out for Santa are always gone on Christmas morning.”
“With the Junior Detective kit that I got this morning, I dusted the cookie plate for fingerprints, and they were Mom’s.”
“So what? Mom set out the plate, and Santa wears gloves.”
Jerry gives up for the year. On Christmas afternoon the next year, he tries again. “Lots of the older kids don’t believe in Santa. They say that their presents only come from their parents.”
“Sure,” Scott said. “Santa only gives presents to those who still believe in him.”
“A few months ago, I was snooping in Dad’s sock drawer, and I found every letter we ever wrote to Santa.”
“Why not? Santa didn’t need them anymore and each year just gives them to Mom and Dad for keepsakes.”
“The only fingerprints on our presents were Mom’s or Dad’s.” 
“Mom and Dad always get up early on Christmas. They could’ve rearranged them.”
“Last week, I found all our presents hidden in a corner in the attic.” Jerry pawed through some of the torn wrapping paper. “I wrote my initials on the bottom of each package. And look—here they are. That proves that Santa didn’t bring them here last night.”
“I asked Mom, and she said that Santa is real. Anyway, how do I know you didn’t write your initials on the wrapping paper this morning?”
Do adults make the same mistakes?
Like little Scott, if you’re determined to believe something, you can rationalize away any unwelcome evidence. (By rationalize, I mean taking an idea as fact and then selecting or interpreting all relevant evidence to make it support that immutable given.)
Christians rationalize, too. They rationalize away contradictions in the Bible, the oddity of a hidden God, or why so much bad happens to the people God loves. They can find a dozen reasons why a particular prayer wasn’t answered, even though the Bible promises, “Ask and ye shall receive.” But the Christian will say that they’re simply defending the truth—they’re not rationalizing; they’re right.
In five minutes we can see flaws in others that we don’t see in ourselves in a lifetime. Perhaps this episode with Jerry and Scott will encourage us to see our own rationalizations.
With a little work, even the nuttiest theory can be given a scholarly sheen. There’s a web site titled, Galileo Was Wrong; The Church Was Right. That’s right, it argues for geocentrism, an earth-centered universe. If scholars can argue that the sun goes around the earth, imagine what a few thousand years of scholarly work can do to a religion. Any Christian can point to centuries of scholarship to give a patina of credibility to their position—but, of course, so can Muslims, Hindus, and those in many other religions.
I can’t prove Santa doesn’t exist. Nor can I disprove leprechauns, Russell’s Flying Teapot, the Flying Spaghetti Monster, or God. The thoughtful person goes where the evidence points rather than accepting only the evidence that supports his preconception.

Jesus is Santa Claus for adults
— bumper sticker

(This is a modified post that was originally published 12/9/11.)

Virgin Birth of Jesus: Fact or Fiction?

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Need a Christmas present for someone who enjoys wrestling with Christianity’s role in modern society? Consider my new book, A Modern Christmas Carol, available as paperback or ebook.
Virgin birth of JesusIn December, thoughts turn toward Christmas. In particular, to the Isaiah quote in Matthew’s narrative of the birth of Jesus: “The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel” (Matt. 1:23).
Matthew documents the fulfillment of a prophecy written 750 years earlier. Powerful evidence of the truth of the Bible?
Well … no. The first reason is the reason by which anyone would reject a claimed prophecy: the evidence of the fulfillment is not independent but comes only through authors (of Matthew and Luke) who one must assume had read the prophecy. They had motive and opportunity to claim a fulfillment where none existed. (I write more about common-sense requirements for a fulfilled prophecy here.)
The original prophecy in Isaiah
But was that quote from Isaiah even a prophecy of a messiah? You’d expect something like, “The LORD God understands the burdens of His people and will send a savior. And ye shall know him by this sign: the virgin will give birth to a son” and so on.
Here’s what that chapter of Isaiah is actually talking about. In the early 700s BCE, Syria and Israel allied with nearby countries for protection against Assyria, the local bully that was vacuuming up smaller states. Judea refused to join the alliance. Syria and Israel, fearing a potential enemy at their rear, moved to conquer Judea.
God spoke through the prophet Isaiah to tell the king of Judea that, with faith, his enemies would be destroyed. Isaiah gives him a sign: “The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel” (7:14). Before the boy is old enough to understand right from wrong, Syria and Israel will be destroyed.
The meaning of the Immanuel prophecy
In other words, in five years or so, your enemies will be destroyed—that’s the point of the Immanuel story. The boy simply acts as a clock. And not only is Immanuel not a messiah, his three-verse story isn’t even a significant part of this chapter, which goes on to describe the impending conquest of Judea by Assyria and Judea’s painful future.
Isaiah prefaces the prophecy to the king with, “Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign.” This sign must be a near-term event, since the king won’t live long enough to see the birth of Jesus centuries later.
Yes, the Immanuel story is a prophecy, but it’s a prophecy that is to be fulfilled in five years, not 750. (And was the prophecy even fulfilled? Apparently not, according to the 2 Chron. 28:5–6 summary. We see another history of the battle in 2 Kings 16:5, with Judea the winner this time, but to argue that Isaiah’s prophecy was fulfilled you must argue that the Bible is contradictory.)
Where’s the miracle?
The Immanuel story doesn’t even claim to be a miracle. Women are virgins before having sex, by definition. The story says that a woman who’s never had sex will then do so, become pregnant, and deliver a boy. Happens all the time. If this prediction involved a miracle, we’d expect more would be made of it to eliminate the (obvious) mundane explanation.
Where’s the Jesus parallel?
And if Immanuel’s story is supposed to foreshadow Jesus, where does the Immanuel prediction (“before the boy knows enough to reject the wrong and choose the right, the land of the two kings you dread will be laid to waste,” Isa. 7:16) map in Jesus’s life?
Does Isaiah even say “virgin”?
To make things even more difficult for Matthew’s claim, the word “virgin” in Isaiah 7:14 doesn’t really say that. First-century scholars could have had access to two versions of Isaiah, the Hebrew original and the Greek translation, the Septuagint. Since the author of Matthew was literate in Greek, he was likely more familiar with the Greek version. But these two versions use different words here—“young woman” in the Hebrew original and “virgin” in the Greek translation. The NET Bible uses the older Hebrew term and has a thorough footnote documenting the scholarship behind this decision.
Why do most Bibles use “virgin,” even though the best sources use “young woman”? Perhaps only to avoid embarrassing Matthew. And that may be changing. The new Catholic Bible, the revised New American Bible (2011), drops “virgin” in favor of “young woman.”
Is Isaiah fulfilled in Jesus?
Matthew prefaces his Isaiah quote by saying, “All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet” (1:22), but the prophecy isn’t fulfilled since Jesus is never called Immanuel—not just in Matthew but anywhere in the New Testament. In fact, Matthew contradicts his own claim of fulfillment just two verses later: “And [Joseph] gave him the name Jesus.”
Pope Benedict’s 2012 book, The Infancy Narratives, emphasizes that the virgin birth is one of the “cornerstones of faith” and assures us that it is not a myth. Though he rejects the idea that mythology entered the gospels, everybody who was anybody during that time in the eastern Mediterranean was virgin born—Alexander the Great in Greece, the Caesars in Rome, the Ptolemies in Egypt.
Despite the proliferation of virgin birth claims at the time, all were false except for the one for Jesus? That needs a lot of evidence, especially when Matthew’s argument is built on nothing more than the misreading of a prophecy that expired centuries earlier.
This is the third biblical prophecy claim that I’ve studied (I’ve also written about Isaiah 53 and Psalm 22). Each has unique features, but I’m struck by one similarity: in context, each is plainly not talking about a future messiah. No serious scholarship is necessary to see this, just a willingness to let each chapter speak for itself. Only a determination to maintain the idea of supernatural prophecies, regardless of the evidence, props them up.

I pray that one day we may live in an America 
where Christians can worship freely, in broad daylight,
openly wearing the symbols of their religion …
 perhaps around their necks? 
And maybe (dare I dream it?)
maybe one day there can be 
an openly Christian president. 
Or, perhaps, 43 of them. Consecutively.
— Jon Stewart

 
(This is a modified version of a post that originally appeared 12/10/12.)
Photo credit: Steve Day

Rick Warren: Is This Really the Way to Help People?

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Christian hypocrisyWhile I’ve been working on getting my new book finished in time for the Christmas season, Rick Warren has been doing the same. He snagged the Parade magazine cover story just a few days before his book launched. Something tells me that he’ll sell more than I will.
Warren’s goal
Warren says that he was inspired to focus on diet while baptizing overweight parishioners a few years ago. He challenged his congregation, enormous in both weight and number, to get healthier. They lost a total of a quarter of a million pounds.
And now he is promoting a new diet inspired by the Old Testament prophet Daniel.
What does Daniel say about diet?
The book of Daniel mentions diet twice. It begins with Daniel and his companions sent as captives from Judah to Babylon to serve in the court of king Nebuchadnezzar. They were offered the same food as the king ate, but Daniel asked for just vegetables and water instead. Their guard feared for his own safety—if these Judeans looked unhealthy, the king would blame him—but Daniel challenged him to a test. They would eat this simple diet for ten days, and the guard could judge. After the test, they did looked better, as promised.
Years later, Daniel had another diet encounter. Chapter 10 says that he fasted for three weeks because of a distressing vision he had been given. This was a no-luxuries fast, not a no-calories fast (“I ate no choice food; no meat or wine came to my lips”).
So, what does Daniel tell us about our diets? The fast had nothing to do with health, since it was either involuntary from mourning or aimed at spiritual purification, though you’ll find 300,000 hits on the internet with a search term “Daniel fast.”
What does Rick Warren say about diet?
I don’t know what Warren says in his book, but—spoiler alert!—if we follow Daniel’s lead, we’ll be vegans, eating only vegetables.
Warren says that Jesus cared about more than getting people into heaven; he cared about their health as well. The interview ends with Warren quoting John 3:16, about God giving Jesus to the world.

It’s a generosity verse. I say you can give without loving, but you cannot love without giving. If you want to become a loving person, you have to learn to give. You spell love G-I-V-E.

Okay, I get it. Americans are overweight. They eat unhealthy food. Warren is a giving person in an influential position, and he wants to do something to help. If he can wrap a diet in a tasty Christian coating, he can do some good.
I’m beginning to like this idea.
So let me anticipate Warren’s approach. He’ll get some nutritionists to create a healthy and sustainable diet, he’ll give it a Christian spin, he’ll make the diet freely available from his web site, and then he’ll use his influence to highlight the project. Maybe he’ll make it available as a free ebook.
Why let profit get in the way of so important a project? Remember, this is the guy who famously reverse-tithes (giving 90% to the church and keeping 10%, rather than the other way around) because of sales of his enormously popular The Purpose Driven Life.
The Rick Warren plan
Wrong. Warren’s The Daniel Plan is not a giveaway. It’s a book, soon available in a handsome hardcover edition on Amazon for just $15.64. Or as a CD for the low, low price of $13.49. Or Audible for $12.24. Or Kindle for $9.78. Buy one or buy them all!
But don’t stop there. There’s also the study guide ($8.78), meant to be used with the DVD ($14.39). And don’t leave without buying the journal ($11.22 hardcover or $7.99 Kindle). And what diet program would be complete without the cookbook? That’s $18.96 hardcover or $11.99 Kindle.
So perhaps instead of “You spell love G-I-V-E” as the guiding principle, the Warren strategists figured that a book combining religion and diet would be a financial marriage made in heaven.
I expected to see packaging a diet as a Christian directive, but it looks to be more packaging a lucrative franchise as a Christian charity.

The greatest single cause of atheism in the world today is Christians,
who acknowledge Jesus with their lips and walk out the door,
and deny Him by their lifestyle.
That is what an unbelieving world simply finds unbelievable.
— Brennan Manning

A Dozen Responses to the Transcendental Argument for God

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Transcendental Argument for GodHave you ever thought about what grounds the laws of logic and mathematics? We know that they work, but why?
The Christian apologist has a quick answer: because of God. They exist and are sustained by God. The Transcendental Argument (TAG) challenges the atheist to resolve this any other way. What besides God could possibly explain the existence of something fundamental like logic? (To see the Christian case for this argument, read the selection from my Cross Examined in an earlier post.)
This argument is of particular interest to me because I was introduced to it in a radio interview—not the best place for careful study and contemplation. (But more on that later.)
1. TAG is just a deist argument
First notice that TAG is a deist argument. If it convinced you, you’d be a deist, not a Christian. The apologist would be obliged to use different arguments to show that the deity was the Christian god, not some other god.
2. We don’t get physics from Christianity
Next, notice that we’ve never gotten physics from Christianity before. Why go to Christianity now to find the fundamental basis for physics? Yes, the Bible tells us how everything got started, but science gives the evidence to make clear that the Bible is wrong.
Nothing useful has ever come from resolving a science question by concluding that God did it. No honest seeker of the truth says, “I don’t know what causes this thing … so therefore I do know! It must’ve been God.”
3. Avoiding logical puzzles invalidates TAG
Many apologists dodge the “Can God make a rock so heavy he can’t lift it?” puzzle by saying that God can’t do anything illogical (here and here)—he can’t make an impossibly heavy rock, a square circle, a married bachelor, and so on. The question is ill-formed.
But by dodging this pitfall, they land in another as God’s actions become constrained by an external logic. If God is bound by logic, logic isn’t arbitrary. God can’t change it. He acts logically because he must, just like the rest of us.
This creates a Euthyphro-like dilemma: either God is bound by an external logic (and God answers to a fixed logic that he can’t change) or he’s not (and logic becomes arbitrary—it is what it is simply because God said so, and he could change it if he wanted to).
The apologist will try to propose a third option (again, as with Euthyphro): logic is simply a consequence of God’s nature. It’s neither external nor arbitrary. But this simply rephrases the problem. Is this nature changeable? Then logic is arbitrary. Is it fixed? Then God is again bound by logic.
Can God be the origin of logic if he’s bound by it?
4. Could God create logic and mathematics? Or is he bound by them?
Let’s think about God creating arithmetic for a moment. “Creation” seems to mean more than simply “bring into existence.” Were God’s hands tied in creating arithmetic, or did he have some creative control? For example, 2 + 2 = 4 in our universe. Could God have made 2 + 2 = 9? If so, prove it. And if not, God was obliged to make arithmetic the way it is and unable to create any other kind. Here again, he answered to an external reality.
5. Consequences of a godless universe
But let’s assume the apologist’s argument and see what happens. God created logic, and logic is the way it is because God made it so. If God’s role here is important, a godless universe must be dramatically different. A godless universe could then have no logic or different logical rules.
In our universe, X can’t be the same thing as not-X (the Law of Identity). Something can’t simultaneously be a rock and not-a-rock. The apologist’s argument tells us that logic is up for grabs. In a godless universe, something might be a rock and not-a-rock. But this is an incredible claim that needs justification. TAG gives none.
Continue with part 2.

Can God make a rock so heavy
that hitting His head with it
would explain the change in personality He underwent
between the Old Testament and the New Testament?
— commenter GubbaBumpkin

Photo credit: Wikimedia

“This is Guaranteed to Convert You!”

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Imagine that an atheist walks into a gathering of Christians. He says, “I hold in my hand a pamphlet that will rock your worldview. In fact, it will almost surely change your worldview. I have shown this to several hundred Christians of many denominations, and shortly after they read it, 90% admitted that their faith in Christianity was pretty much gone.
“Now—who wants a copy?”
How many Christians would take the challenge? How many would risk their worldview for a chance at a more correct worldview?
My guess is very few. My guess is that most Christians already have had pangs of doubt and don’t like them. They don’t want the boat rocked—it’s rocking enough as it is. They suppress their own doubt and they avoid any “opportunity” to increase that doubt.
But now turn that experiment thought around. Imagine that a Christian speaks to the atheists at a conference and says, “I hold in my hand a pamphlet that will rock your worldview. It has insights and arguments that you probably don’t know about. I have shown this to hundreds of atheists, and shortly after they read it, 90% went down on their knees and accepted the truth of the gospel message and asked Jesus into their hearts. Now—who wants a copy?”
How many atheists would take the challenge? My guess is many. My guess is that most atheists came to their position because of evidence, not because of suppressing it, and that they’re eager to find the most correct worldview. They hold on to atheism because they think it’s the truth, not because it’s convenient or pleasing, and they follow the evidence where it leads.
What would you do? And what does this say about the truth of the Christian and atheist positions and the role of evidence in those worldviews?
Related post: “I Used to be an Atheist, Just Like You”.

God is an ever-receding pocket of scientific ignorance
that’s getting smaller and smaller and smaller as time goes on.
— Neil deGrasse Tyson

Acknowledgement: Thanks to Keith B. for this insightful idea.
Photo credit: Brandeis Special Collections