QuoteWorld-renowned atheist Richard Dawkins says he supports the mission of England's Department for Education to make sure every public school in the nation has a copy of the 1611 translation of the King James Bible.
QuoteBut Dawkins is backing the distribution plan, albeit with an "ulterior motive."
"I have an ulterior motive for wishing to contribute to Gove's scheme," he wrote. "People who do not know the Bible well have been gulled into thinking it is a good guide to morality ... I have even heard the cynically misanthropic opinion that, without the Bible as a moral compass, people would have no restraint against murder, theft and mayhem. The surest way to disabuse yourself of this pernicious falsehood is to read the Bible itself."
Atheist Richard Dawkins Supports Bibles in Schools (http://www.christianpost.com/news/atheist-richard-dawkins-supports-bibles-in-schools-75290/)
Interesting. Many Christians believe that if one simply reads the bible, one can and many have been converted.
Could it backfire on RD? I think both are correct.
I often think that Dawkins lacks common sense.
Those who wish to read what Professor Dawkins actually wrote in full can find the article on
The Guardian's site (http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2012/may/19/richard-dawkins-king-james-bible).
Quote from: AnimatedDirt on May 22, 2012, 05:43:14 PMMany Christians believe that if one simply reads the bible, one can and many have been converted.
On the other hand, you've been here long enough to have seen at least a few people who've come here and said that reading the Bible was the beginning of their journey away from Christianity. It might be difficult to find good evidence one way or the other, but we can be sure that there is no predictable outcome for those who take the time to read it (not that many of the students in these schools will be doing so voluntarily).
Quote from: AnimatedDirt on May 22, 2012, 05:43:14 PMCould it backfire on RD? I think both are correct.
I'm not sure what you mean by "backfire," but I don't think that Dawkins has much to worry about, in regards to this initiative. I believe that he was sincere in his praise of the King James Bible as literature.
Quote from: Recusant on May 22, 2012, 07:51:49 PM
Those who wish to read what Professor Dawkins actually wrote in full can find the article on The Guardian's site (http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2012/may/19/richard-dawkins-king-james-bible).
I expected nothing less from RD on the matter.
Quote from: RecusantOn the other hand, you've been here long enough to have seen at least a few people who've come here and said that reading the Bible was the beginning of their journey away from Christianity. It might be difficult to find good evidence one way or the other, but we can be sure that there is no predictable outcome for those who take the time to read it (not that many of the students in these schools will be doing so voluntarily).
Of course. The only thing I'm saying is that most Christians claim that if one would only read the bible, there's a good chance for a conversion, if not certain...not that it's a fact.
Quote from: RecusantI'm not sure what you mean by "backfire," but I don't think that Dawkins has much to worry about, in regards to this initiative. I believe that he was sincere in his praise of the King James Bible as literature.
Backfire only in that it become similar to the tale of Joseph.
Personal experience: Was atheist. Read Bible. Thought "Crap." Remained atheist. Read the Qur'an. Thought "Crap." Remained atheist. Still atheist.
Quote from: Asmodean on May 22, 2012, 09:30:24 PM
Personal experience: Was atheist. Read Bible. Thought "Crap." Remained atheist. Read the Qur'an. Thought "Crap." Remained atheist. Still atheist.
Got it.
No one made the claim that it is absolute. It's just the general thinking of Christians...and not necessarily mine.
Quote from: AnimatedDirt on May 22, 2012, 09:15:44 PM
Quote from: Recusant on May 22, 2012, 07:51:49 PMI'm not sure what you mean by "backfire," but I don't think that Dawkins has much to worry about, in regards to this initiative. I believe that he was sincere in his praise of the King James Bible as literature.
Backfire only in that it become similar to the tale of Joseph.
Assuming that you refer here to the story in the later chapters of Genesis, I'll admit that I don't see its relevance. I'm mildly intrigued though. What (or who) is the place-holder for the Bible in this story? Who might be thought to represent Dawkins?
Quote from: AnimatedDirt on May 22, 2012, 09:44:56 PM
Quote from: Asmodean on May 22, 2012, 09:30:24 PM
Personal experience: Was atheist. Read Bible. Thought "Crap." Remained atheist. Read the Qur'an. Thought "Crap." Remained atheist. Still atheist.
Got it.
No one made the claim that it is absolute. It's just the general thinking of Christians...and not necessarily mine.
Oh, I understand. On occasion, I have been asked how it was possible for someone who has read the Book(tm) not to have let YHWH/Jesus/Allah into their soul. Applies to both books, really.
The short answer is that I have not let them into my "soul" because I have none. The long answer is that fictional characters from ancient fables just don't interest me all that much.
Quote from: Recusant on May 22, 2012, 09:47:23 PM
Assuming that you refer here to the story in the later chapters of Genesis, I'll admit that I don't see its relevance. I'm mildly intrigued though. What (or who) is the place-holder for the Bible in this story? Who might be thought to represent Dawkins?
No specific character attributed to RD, however the gist being what the brothers did tp their brother, was turned to everyone's benefit.
What may seem as something to showcase simple literature, may do much more. Who knows.
I wish more people would actually read the bible and see what a piece of crap fiction it is. It isnt even well written fiction. :(
Quote from: AnimatedDirt on May 22, 2012, 09:15:44 PM
Of course. The only thing I'm saying is that most Christians claim that if one would only read the bible, there's a good chance for a conversion, if not certain...not that it's a fact.
I think that's just another thing some Xtians say to convince themselves that their book is magic. I knew a guy once absolutely refused to believe I'd read the bible because if I had I'd have instantly turned Xtian. In fact, I've read it twice and most of the ex-theists or ex-trying-to-be-theists I know got their ex- status after reading the bible from cover to cover. I encourage everyone to read it, and I'm all for the bible being taught as literature in public schools.
Quote from: OldGit on May 22, 2012, 07:15:32 PM
I often think that Dawkins lacks common sense.
He takes himself terribly seriously and whatever his intellectual gifts is seriousl deficient in the social and emotional intelligence stakes. His aggression and condescension have probably alienated rather than attracted sympathy for the atheist cause.
Quote from: BooksCatsEtc on May 23, 2012, 07:17:42 AMI'm all for the bible being taught as literature in public schools.
I fully agree. On the condition that they examine
all of the bible, not just goody goody bits...
This is pretty much what I would expect from Dawkins. As for reading the Bible it was Mark Twain who said "The best cure for Christianity is reading the Bible".
I don't have a problem with children or schools having access to any religious text. I wouldn't want teachers to teach that everything in the bible is literally true, but it's useful for understanding inter-textual references in a lot of works. The bible is something that gets referenced a lot.
Quote from: DeterminedJuliet on May 23, 2012, 01:54:17 PM
I don't have a problem with children or schools having access to any religious text. I wouldn't want teachers to teach that everything in the bible is literally true, but it's useful for understanding inter-textual references in a lot of works. The bible is something that gets referenced a lot.
They could be like "this was written around the same time as... " whatever.
I think most kids are naturally skeptics too. So teaching the bible in school the same way greek.mythology is taught is fine
They will see it for ridiculous donkey shit .
Quote from: Sweetdeath on May 23, 2012, 02:28:16 PM
I think most kids are naturally skeptics too.
I heard young kids were more or less hard-wired to trust their elders... Not sure though, because my own wiring has always been... Special.
Quote from: Sweetdeath on May 23, 2012, 02:28:16 PM
Quote from: DeterminedJuliet on May 23, 2012, 01:54:17 PM
I don't have a problem with children or schools having access to any religious text. I wouldn't want teachers to teach that everything in the bible is literally true, but it's useful for understanding inter-textual references in a lot of works. The bible is something that gets referenced a lot.
They could be like "this was written around the same time as... " whatever.
I think most kids are naturally skeptics too. So teaching the bible in school the same way greek.mythology is taught is fine
They will see it for ridiculous donkey shit .
Unfortunately this is most definitely
not the case. Kids do accept their parents authority without question the vast majority of the time. You'll hear parents bleating about unruly kids, but that's generally after puberty hits. Between 3 and 11 kids are pretty much in the intellectual thrall of their parents.
That reminds me of when i overheard a parent telling their 9 yr old son about how a policeman's job is to take down bad guys. I felt sick. Such "this is right. This is wrong" thinking is dangerous.
Also this happen during a case in nyc where two policemen were on trial for taking a drunk women home from a bar and raping her....
Has building surveilance if them entering her residence, then leaving two hours later. One of them stood "look out."
Quote from: Tank on May 23, 2012, 02:45:49 PM
Unfortunately this is most definitely not the case. Kids do accept their parents authority without question the vast majority of the time.
That was certainly the case with me -- adults told me something and I automatically assumed they knew what they were talking about and went along with it. It took some time for those scales to fall.
Quote from: BooksCatsEtc on May 23, 2012, 03:16:18 PM
Quote from: Tank on May 23, 2012, 02:45:49 PM
Unfortunately this is most definitely not the case. Kids do accept their parents authority without question the vast majority of the time.
That was certainly the case with me -- adults told me something and I automatically assumed they knew what they were talking about and went along with it. It took some time for those scales to fall.
Same here. From the time I was a toddler (ie, vaguely aware that I was even in a church, although my grasp was fuzzy at best as to what it meant to be there) to the time I was 13 or 14, I was very much under the influence of my family and their beliefs. True, it was a mixed bag of beliefs. True, nobody was really what I'd call a hardcore fundie. All the same, it was the accepted norm that the Bible was true, that Christianity was true, that good people believed in God while bad people didn't, etc. It was very black and white, for me. I was never forced to go to church several times a week, never forced to do anything, really. It was just assumed I was Catholic and that was that.
One other thing I wasn't forced to do was read the Bible. My family just assumed that because the bible was read during Mass on Sundays (nevermind it being carefully selected bits with warm fuzzy largely humanistic explanations - ie, the 'feel good' stuff), that really ought to be enough for anyone. The standard default position was "we're Catholics, we're more balanced and reasonable, we're not obsessed with the Bible like those fundie protestants are!" and they prided themselves on that - go to work, raise your kids, enjoy life, and pay lip service to a religion and Bible you really don't KNOW a lot about.
So... imagine my surprise when I was given my own bible as a 15 year old. I excitedly went down to the local Christian store, got those 'bible tabs' (the ones that have the bible book names on them), set my bible up, and started reading. And reading. By the end of a couple weeks, I'd read through huge chunks of the Old Testament (I was already familiar with the New Testament), and I had more questions than answers. Mind you, I was trying VERY hard to believe. I cherrypicked the nice stuff, for a long time. I read the NT often, taking comfort in the nicer bits... but I kept returning to the verses that left me feeling cold and disgusted. The God I found there didn't in any way jive with the loving, forgiving, father-God I'd been raised to believe in. This one seemed more like a vengeful, cold, jealous psycho. So I started asking my questions, and got all the usual responses. Everything from God's justice and righteousness, to 'that was then, this is now', to 'if God created it, he can destroy it too', etc. It still didn't make sense.
As the years went on, I continued to read. I continued to be surprised (not in a good way) by how I saw God being portrayed. I started to wonder how many people around me even KNEW most of this stuff was in the Bible (turns out, not too many). Once I read the Bible through the lens of looking at the character of God, I started reading it to look for the science, the history, the general ideas and philosophies. Again, surprised and not in a good way. What the bible said about huge groups of people dismayed me and sickened me. What it said about who deserved hell or not sickened me. What it said about who people had to be, otherwise God would reject them sickened me. What it said about human nature in general upset me. And that's when the doubts really started kicking in. The more I read, the more I questioned.
Eventually, I came to see the bible for what it was: a long-lasting conglomeration of books, selected by committee, all of them a product of their time, worldview, and culture. No more, no less. As literature, many of the books have value. I recommend that all people have access to these and other religious texts in their entirety, not brief, carefully selected segments and parables. Some of the books have good stories in them, or interesting ideas. Others have horror stories and very bad ideas.
But I do think the surest way to get a child to WANT to read the Bible is to ban it, and refuse the child access to it, or control what he or she reads out of it. I say give them the whole thing and talk it over as objectively as possible. In this way, I do agree that people should be able to read the Bible and other religious texts -- not from the premise that it must be true or that they ought to believe it, but from the premise that they should know what the ideas are inside it, so that they can evaluate them for themselves.
Sorry for the long post, if anyone read it. This is just stuff I've been thinking about for a long while.
Quote from: Amicale on May 23, 2012, 05:05:22 PM
Sorry for the long post, if anyone read it. This is just stuff I've been thinking about for a long while.
I read it, and appauld it -- wonderful post, Ami.
I do think that allowing bibles to be required reading in high school, along side other religious texts, would encourage debate between students about what the meaning of the texts could be. I mean think about it. If I went to Bible school(hypothetical scenario) and was taught that passage x meant y, but was taught in public school that passage x could mean y or z, then I would most likely develop a better ability to interpret the bible on my own. This may not cause me to reject it entirely, but when comparing it to other religious texts, or to other ancient mythologies, may lead me to at least have a more tolerant view of religions other than my own, and if I decide not to reject the religion of my parents, I would at least less likely to become a fundamentalist. The fewer the number of religious fundamentalists in the world, the more cooperative and peaceful civil society should become. At least, that would be my hope.
As to actually reading the bible? I started reading the Old Testament numerous times, but once I got past Genesis, it all became incredibly boring; maybe I ought to give it another whirl? My uncle did buy me my first Bible when I was twelve, or thirteen, for Christmas. In fact, all of his nieces and nephews received a copy of the King James Bible that year and he offered each of us ten dollars if we read the New Testament. Being a glutton for money, I read it and collected. Now, this particular copy had all of Christ's words in red and I couldn't help but be skeptical as to how the style of the narration closely matched the style in which Jesus spoke; it just didn't seem believable that those were Jesus's exact words.
Quote from: BooksCatsEtc on May 24, 2012, 03:25:24 AM
Quote from: Amicale on May 23, 2012, 05:05:22 PM
Sorry for the long post, if anyone read it. This is just stuff I've been thinking about for a long while.
I read it, and appauld it -- wonderful post, Ami.
I agree.
Quote from: Amicale on May 23, 2012, 05:05:22 PM
...and got all the usual responses. Everything from God's justice and righteousness, to 'that was then, this is now', to 'if God created it, he can destroy it too', etc.
Hey, that reminds me of someone I know. Scratches head.
Hmmmm, are these pre-canned answers?
Quote from: Sweetdeath on May 23, 2012, 05:51:15 AM
I wish more people would actually read the bible and see what a piece of crap fiction it is. It isnt even well written fiction. :(
Honestly, the first five pages are enough to see how scientifically inaccurate, sexist, vindictive and unjust this book and its god are. Not to mention the extremely poor wording and repetition.
Atrocious book.
Thing is if anybody sent the Bible to a publisher today as fiction it would be rejected because it doesn't have a consistent narrative. If anybody sent it to a publisher today as a non-fiction publication it would be laughed out of the office for inaccuracy and inconsistency (there are two different creation myths, both wrong). The ONLY reason the Bible is considered valid is because of historical assertion.
I've listened to enough of Dawkins' debates and interviews to know that he thinks the KJV (specifically) is important literature, and it is an important heritage for the English language. I don't think he meant that schools should have a copy for religious purposes.
Quote from: Tank on May 24, 2012, 11:06:36 AM
Thing is if anybody sent the Bible to a publisher today as fiction it would be rejected because it doesn't have a consistent narrative. If anybody sent it to a publisher today as a non-fiction publication it would be laughed out of the office for inaccuracy and inconsistency (there are two different creation myths, both wrong). The ONLY reason the Bible is considered valid is because of historical assertion.
Quote from: xSilverPhinx on May 24, 2012, 02:21:14 PM
I've listened to enough of Dawkins' debates and interviews to know that he thinks the KJV (specifically) is important literature, and it is an important heritage for the English language. I don't think he meant that schools should have a copy for religious purposes.
Not at all, he was clear about the bible being taught only as literature, not as a religious text.
Penn Jillette, the talking part of acting duo Penn & Teller seems to have had the experience of reading himself out of faith.
Check it out, it's a good story. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3rGev6OZ3w
As for bibles being available to school children, I am always in favor of reading. And you need to read the whole thing if you are gonna put any serious stock by it.
Quote from: BooksCatsEtc on May 24, 2012, 03:00:10 PM
Quote from: xSilverPhinx on May 24, 2012, 02:21:14 PM
I've listened to enough of Dawkins' debates and interviews to know that he thinks the KJV (specifically) is important literature, and it is an important heritage for the English language. I don't think he meant that schools should have a copy for religious purposes.
Not at all, he was clear about the bible being taught only as literature, not as a religious text.
In theory, teachers teaching the Bible as literature only works up to a certain point fairly well - you can reference the creation myth, or the trials of Job, or David and Goliath, and compare them to modern literature, look for archetypes, all that. But in practice, your students are aware that many people DO believe the Bible is an accurate religious text, and that's when they start asking questions: "So, is this (particular story) true or not?" and "What do YOU believe?" and "Do people still believe ALL of these stories are true now?" .... and all of a sudden, you've got a religious conversation on your hands, whether you wanted one or not. :D
When that's happened to me, I've responded with 'well, what do you think?' or 'hmm, what evidence do we see in the world today that that particular story (say, the global flood) is actually true?' or I've just answered generally with 'some people believe that; others don't' in response to queries.
I'm all for giving students, kids, teens etc bibles and having them read critically and objectively....
... and then again, "hell" hath no fury like a pissed off parent at a PTA meeting because I refused to tell their kid something was absolutely literally true. :D (or for that matter, the PTA parents who chewed me out for even bothering to bring up the old bible stories at all!)