I watched "Now" with Bill Moyers Friday night. At the beginning of the program a woman was shown answering a reporter's question by saying that she believed God created the universe "in six literal days, about six thousand years ago." Man. How can I even begin to describe my frustration at this? I ask myself why I care. Let the fundies believe whatever they like. The problem is they have enough clout now to have a say in government policy, and that's scary, because if they get their way we'll all be forced to live by societal dictates established thousands of years ago.
One problem, as I see it, is the reluctance to tell someone they're wrong. It's impolite to criticize another person's religion, right? It's just not done. We think there is no "right" or "wrong" where religion is concerned, because it's all a matter of faith. So nobody says "Are you aware that no respectable Biblical scholar on the planet believes the Bible is the Literal Word Of God? Have you decided to reject all scholarship that does not study the Bible under the assumption that it is literally true?"
Biblical scholars know the Bible is lousy with contradictions; fundamentalists are in denial. Take the first two chapters of Genesis, now believed to have been written by different people, the texts combined sometime after King David united the northern and southern kingdoms of Judea and Israel. These two chapters tell two versions of the story of creation. Don't take my word for it--read Who Wrote the Bible? by Richard E. Friedman, a Harvard-educated Biblical scholar.
In chapter one, God creates all the animals before He creates man. The relevant verses are 25 and 26. In the King James version, they read:
25--And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
26--And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
No matter which translation you read, it's clear that God creates the animals first, then man. In chapter 2, God creates man before the animals. The relevant verses in chapter 2 are 18 and 19, and this is how they read in a bunch of translations:
Amplified Bible:
18--Now the Lord God said, It is not good (sufficient, satisfactory) that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper meet (suitable, adapted, complementary) for him.
19--And out of the ground the Lord God formed every [wild] beast and living creature of the field and every bird of the air and brought them to Adam to see what he would call them; and whatever Adam called every living creature, that was its name.
Contemporary English Version:
18--The LORD God said, "It isn't good for the man to live alone. I need to make a suitable partner for him." 19--So the LORD took some soil and made animals and birds. He brought them to the man to see what names he would give each of them. Then the man named the tame animals and the birds and the wild animals. That's how they got their names.
English Standard Version:
18--Then the LORD God said, "It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him." 19--So out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name.
Holman Christian Standard Bible:
18--Then the LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper who is like him." 19--So the LORD God formed out of the ground each wild animal and each bird of the sky, and brought each to the man to see what he would call it. And whatever the man called a living creature, that was its name.
King James:
18--And the LORD God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.
19--And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof.
21st Century King James:
18--And the LORD God said, "It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper meet for him."
19--And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air, and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them; and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof.
The Message:
18--GOD said, "It's not good for the Man to be alone; I'll make him a helper, a companion." 19--So GOD formed from the dirt of the ground all the animals of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to the Man to see what he would name them. Whatever the Man called each living creature, that was its name.
New American Standard Bible:
18--Then the LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him."
19--Out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the sky, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called a living creature, that was its name.
New Life Version:
18--Then the Lord God said, 'It is not good for man to be alone. I will make a helper that is right for him.'
19--Out of the ground the Lord God made every animal of the field and every bird of the sky. He brought them to the man to find out what he would call them. And whatever the man called a living thing, that was its name.
New Living Translation:
18--And the LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a companion who will help him." 19--So the LORD God formed from the soil every kind of animal and bird. He brought them to Adam to see what he would call them, and Adam chose a name for each one.
Young's Literal Translation:
18--And Jehovah God saith, `Not good for the man to be alone, I do make to him an helper -- as his counterpart.'
19--And Jehovah God formeth from the ground every beast of the field, and every fowl of the heavens, and bringeth in unto the man, to see what he doth call it; and whatever the man calleth a living creature, that [is] its name.
Now check out these two, and note the difference:
New International Version (completed in 1978)
18--The LORD God said, It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.
19--Now the LORD God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name.
Darby Translation:
18--And Jehovah Elohim said, It is not good that Man should be alone; I will make him a helpmate, his like.
19--And out of the ground Jehovah Elohim had formed every animal of the field and all fowl of the heavens, and brought [them] to Man, to see what he would call them; and whatever Man called each living soul, that was its name.
Emphasis mine. One of the translators of the NIV says they took a "balanced approach to difficulties." The Darby translation was apparently completed in 1890, and I can't find much information on Darby's approach. Evidently the translators of the NIV realized the "difficulty" in God's having created man first in the 2nd chapter, and edited the translation to remove the contradiction! Which means they had to have realized it was a contradiction.
It wasn't the only one--read the story of Noah again. How many animals was he told to take? Two of each? Seven of some and two of others? Two stories of the flood have been intertwined.
In short, Jewish tradition has always said Moses wrote the first five books of the Old Testament, but there isn't a respected Biblical scholar on the planet who believes Moses wrote a word of it.
You might think this doesn't matter to Christians--oh, but it does. Because in the New Testament Jesus referred repeatedly to Moses having written the law. Well, that's what Jews believed 2000 years ago. But think about what that says: either Jesus knew neither more nor less than the Jews of his day, or He didn't really say the stuff He's recorded as having said. Either way, bad news if you're a Christian.
I want somebody to have the nerve to tell the woman who believes the universe is 6000 years old that she's full of crap. I want people to stop being polite and challenge the religious beliefs of these nut cases. Politicians don't have the integrity or the guts, and neither does the news media.
Rant off.
Good rant. Interesting how different versions of the bible managed to adjust the wording to plaster over the inconsistencies. Like you, I'd like to throttle the nutjobs who think Bishop Ussher was right, but usually I'm not in a position to do so (which is actually good; I hate confrontation.)
OTOH, I did get a bit of a hit in, though I wish I had gone it even one better. Phoenix Library recently installed filters for the first time on the Internet computers (see my blog for rants), and a gentleman (*cough*) came in and wanted to know why his Very Important Site was being blocked. Well, it turned out it *wasn't*, that there was another issue altogether -- but in his insistence that he get to talk to me, my supervisor, the head of the library, the assistant head of the library, ad nauseum, he said "This site is very spiritual, it reaches people's souls. Getting this site accessible, why it's just as if Jesus himself were asking you to fix the problem!" (Yes, he actually said that.)
I said "I think you've overstated things with that, sir." I wish I had had the thought to say "That's arrogant and prideful which, last I checked, was a mortal sin." Damn, just don't think of these things when they'd do the most good.
Arrogance and pride seem traits of the fundies, and I have horrible images of them imposing these beliefs on the rest of us. Makes Europe seem like a better and better place all the time... wanna go?
Hey don't tempt me. Just last night I stumbled on a French immersion language program on one of the obscure cable channels, and I watched it for an hour, trying to brush up.
*snort* I ordered a language-immersion catalog last week and was rolling through all the Spanish-language school locales. Great minds -- or scared ones -- think alike. I think my French is now forever buried under the Spanish.