# Biblical Liberalism (2006) **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 21, 2006, 5:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454 "2006-07-21T05:59:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2006, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/21 "2006-07-22T17:55:14Z")
> [@Larry Borgia](#): > > Ok, first I’m probably the wrong person to be defending liberal christianity, or Christianity of any sort. I’m not a Christian, wasn’t raised in any religious tradition, don’t go to Church except for weddings and funerals, and have only read the Bible a couple of times, and not the whole Bible either. > > That being said what I don’t get is why anyone would care. If someone is non-violent, tolerant of others, not bigoted, and not trying to ban science from the classroom or “offensive” art from the galleries, what difference does it make if they believe in Jesus, Buddha, Zeus, Bast, Santa, or nothing? What difference does someone’s doctrine of hell make, if you are sure you won’t be going there anyway? Fundamentalist Christianity–Fundamentalist religion in general–scares me because of the intolerance and the violence. Liberal Christianity doesn’t. I’ve seen the comfort it can provide people in their hour of darkness. I’ve seen people draw on their faith for strength when their child was murdered. Why would anyone want to deprive them of that? > > Religious belief seems pretty hard-wired into humans. If you supress it, it often returns in even more obnoxious forms, like Maoism or Naziism. The best thing to do is to follow the constitution and let people worship freely and privately in a manner of their own choosing and base public policy on secular reasoning. Most liberal Christians seem to agree with this. > > Also, please stop the whole “fighting ignorance” thing as though it was some sacred mission. It’s just a catch-phrase Ed and Cecil probably dreamed up over a few old style’s. For me, it’s curiosity. I don’t deny a person their right to believe whatever they want to believe, but that doesn’t stop me from wondering why they believe it when all the evidence points in the opposite direction. Call it discussion, debate, or fighting ignorance. I find the subject interesting. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2006, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/22 "2006-07-22T18:31:44Z")
> [@godzillatemple](#): > > Note to self: HTML doesn’t work on this message board… Consider your ignorance fought. 😃 Anyway, Martin Gardner, who I respect as skeptic and thinker, said he believed these things (despite the killjoy intrusions of reason) because he found them consoling. Didn’t make me respect Gardner any less. ---
**Author:** ![badchad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b77776/32.png) [@badchad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/badchad)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/23 "2006-07-23T01:23:14Z")
> [@Larry Borgia](#): > > Ok, first I’m probably the wrong person to be defending liberal Christianity Yeah, that’s what I thought you were going to say.😉 > [@](#): > > That being said what I don’t get is why anyone would care. If someone is non-violent, tolerant of others, not bigoted, and not trying to ban science from the classroom or “offensive” art from the galleries, what difference does it make if they believe in Jesus, Buddha, Zeus, Bast, Santa, or nothing? What difference does someone’s doctrine of hell make, if you are sure you won’t be going there anyway? Fundamentalist Christianity–Fundamentalist religion in general–scares me because of the intolerance and the violence. Liberal Christianity doesn’t. I’ve seen the comfort it can provide people in their hour of darkness. I’ve seen people draw on their faith for strength when their child was murdered. Why would anyone want to deprive them of that? I did explain several tangible reasons in my post above. If I had to sum it up into one primary reason it is that the concept of faith is concept for which its value does not cover its expenses. The number of people who are murdered every day because of differences in faith trounces (by a large margin) any temporary comfort you say it gives some people. Many atheist philosophers think of death as something no more scary than a sleep more carefree than you have ever had. Epicurus, hundreds of years before Christ talked of death as being no different than what you felt before your birth and that this is hardly something to be feared. As such, the need for faith to comfort one in the hour of darkness is really only needed because the fear of punishment and retribution instilled by religion in the first place. While you say liberal Christians are less intolerant and less violent they still promote faith in Jesus and the afterlife, and Polycarp in particular still thinks hell is some kind of bad place. How bad they want to admit hell is, is debatable, but if we take Jesus at his word, hell is really bad and really eternal. If we accept this, then it is not unreasonable for fundamentalist to kill unbelievers (who are evil) if they think doing so will result in saving other souls who would have followed a bad example burn in hell themselves. And yes, the bible does explicitly say it’s ok to kill unbelievers for this very reason. Fundamentalist are not generally killing without reason they are killing for reasons based on false premises. Liberal Christians commit the crime of encouraging these false premises, which fundamentalists then follow to their logical conclusions. > [@](#): > > Also, please stop the whole “fighting ignorance” thing as though it was some sacred mission. It’s just a catch-phrase Ed and Cecil probably dreamed up over a few old style’s. I like fighting ignorance. Perhaps you should post on a message board with mission more inline with your views. ---
**Author:** ![badchad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b77776/32.png) [@badchad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/badchad)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/24 "2006-07-23T01:30:40Z")
> [@Bryan Ekers](#): > > Anyway, Martin Gardner, who I respect as skeptic and thinker, said he believed these things (despite the killjoy intrusions of reason) because he found them consoling. Didn’t make me respect Gardner any less. I respect him less. As a braver skeptic and thinker put it: “There is something feeble, and a little contemptible, about a man who cannot face the perils of life without the help of comfortable myths” Bertrand Russell ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/25 "2006-07-23T02:45:49Z")
Yeah, but Russell was a dork. ---
**Author:** ![badchad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b77776/32.png) [@badchad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/badchad)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/26 "2006-07-23T13:43:23Z")
> [@Bryan Ekers](#): > > Yeah, but Russell was a dork. Wow, I take it that’s the best you can do. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/27 "2006-07-23T13:56:01Z")
Jesus is not alleged by the Gospels to have said anything about Hell. ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/28 "2006-07-23T14:26:51Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > Jesus is not alleged by the Gospels to have said anything about Hell. According to [http://www.comparative-religion.com/articles/jesus\_hell.php:](http://www.comparative-religion.com/articles/jesus_hell.php:) > [@](#): > > In the New Testament, however, the emphasis begins to broaden. There are three words here translated as hell: > Hades - a Greek word and more encompassing term relating not simply to the grave-pit, but to the world of death itself, > Tartarus - used just once (2Peter 2:4), to denote a place of imprisonment in a state of death, > And Gahenna - being a reference to the waste dumps outside of the city of Jerusalem in the Valley of Hinnom, where all the rubbish was burned - carcasses among it, including those of condemned people - ‘the damned’. The prodigious amount of trash from that great city meant that somewhere in Gahenna there was always a fire burning. > \*\*It is important to note that Jesus referred to Gahenna eleven times, and Hades just four (at least, in the Greek that the scriptures are translated from). \*\* In the gospels, of those sixteen references to Hell, nine are in the Gospel of Matthew alone, three in Mark, and three in Luke. There is no mention of Hell in the Gospel of John, though that gospel is the only one to actually mention the word grave - and only when relating to Lazarus (John 11:17, 31, 38; 12:17). > Almost surprisingly, Revelations refers to Hades (Rev 1:18, 6:8, 20:13-14) - a place and state of death - rather than the fires of Gahenna itself - although it does refer to fires and Hellfire no less than twenty-six times - only five less than the entire four gospels together. > Fire is referred to more often than Gahenna in all of the gospels, but Gahenna is clearly implied, and the figurative use would certainly not have been lost on a first century Jewish audience. Sounds kinda hell-y to me. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/29 "2006-07-23T14:43:25Z")
Gehenna wasn’t Hell, it was an actual physical valley outside of Jerusalem. It was conceived of as a place of anihilation, not eternal torment. It wasn’t otherwrldly. Hades was the standard Greek translation of _Sheol_, which wasn’t Hell either. _Sheol_ was an underworld (pretty much like Hades) where it was believed that EVERYBODY went (not just bad people) to await the eventual resurrection and judgement of all people (after which the bad people would be anihilated). Often times in the Hebrew Bible, _Sheol_ is used virtually synomously to mean “death” or “the grave.” There is not and has never been any concept of “Hell” as a place of eternal torment (though there are some ideas about _temporary punishment_). ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/30 "2006-07-23T14:45:17Z")
> [@](#): > > There is not and has never been any concept of “Hell” as a place of eternal torment (though there are some ideas about temporary punishment). That should say, “There never has been any such concept…IN JUDAISM.” ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/31 "2006-07-23T14:55:48Z")
Hijack Very impressive, **Dio**. Few people that I’ve met of either Christian or Jewish belief have even the foggiest notion of the distinctions you just made. Bravo. (You all will notice I rarely chime in on religious debate here anymore, because I find rehashing the same things over and over to be be trite and tiresome, ymmv. But I just had to publicly acknowlege Dio’s statements. I may not agree with his world view, but he sure does seem to know what the hell the subject he’s aguing is.) End hijack ---
**Author:** ![George\_Kaplin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/3e96dc/32.png) [@George\_Kaplin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/George_Kaplin)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 3:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/32 "2006-07-23T15:12:59Z")
**Dio** Just out of curiosity, how did the Christian conception of Hell as a place of eternal torment arise? ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/33 "2006-07-23T15:29:07Z")
> [@George Kaplin](#): > > **Dio** > > Just out of curiosity, how did the Christian conception of Hell as a place of eternal torment arise? It probably emerged from Hellenistic influences in the first couple of centuries and was eventually written about by early Christian theologians like Tertullian and Augustine and became adopted as Church doctrine. The imagery of Christian Hell also owes a lot to Dante. ---
**Author:** ![badchad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b77776/32.png) [@badchad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/badchad)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/34 "2006-07-23T16:16:05Z")
And here comes Diogenes, right on cue, with his Jesus didn’t talk of hell speech. > [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > Jesus is not alleged by the Gospels to have said anything about Hell. Yes, Diogenes I know you believe that. Having watched you debate the issue with me and many others over the years I can’t help but get an image of plugging holes in a dike but running out of fingers and screaming allegory to Lazarus’ rich friend tormented by flame. Suffice it to say that I find your argument unconvincing but I am willing to admit it as a possibility and did so above. Unless you have changed since we last spoke, you think Christ just murders souls Hitler style. While I disagree with your assessment, I did mention the killing of souls rather than the torturing of souls as one of the contingencies. > [@badchad](#): > > To make you metaphor match Jesus’ description of hell in the bible, the parent then goes on to **kill** /torture/torment/punish (take your pick)… See, I put the kill part first, and I did so just for you. Also in the thread that was recently closed, where this discussion stems from, I made another concession to your views. [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=379546&page=6](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=379546&page=6) > [@badchad](#): > > That’s a pretty subjective rule. I think it is being jerky, in deed, to go around professing ones love to a deity who explicitly stated he intends to punish me and most of humanity forever and ever. **Or if we are to soften Jesus’ statements down to accept Diogenes the Cynics’ interpretation of hell** , merely intends to murder my soul, and the soul of billions, and toss our corpses into a flaming garbage dump. That’s not nice, and as much as one might give lip service to “love” being a jerk doesn’t even begin to describe it. Anyway, it really doesn’t matter if you are right, as virtually no Christians read the bible you do, and virtually no Christians agree with you. If you will notice, I was in a discussion with Polycarp, **a Christian** about Christian held concepts, and Polycarp, near as I can tell, believes some kind of bad afterlife scenario for bad people: > [@Polycarp](#): > > Hell is where you are when you’ve irrevocably destroyed all your possibilities and all you have left is regrets. These are not the words of someone who believes a given soul is dead. Dead souls don’t have regrets. I was not in a discussion with you, **an atheist/agnostic** arguing the finer points of translation. I can’t do both at the same time and I’ll thank you not to muddle up my thread. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/35 "2006-07-23T16:50:21Z")
Well, this **is** fun. But in some ways justified. First point I want to make is, I believe in the freedom of human beings to make value judgments about the data they accumulate about the world they live in. For example, and not to hijack this, I’ve seen an accrual of evidence that suggests **to me** that Bush partisans attempted to subvert the electoral process in 2000 and 2004. That’s **my own subjective evaluation** of the data. I respect **Bricker** ’s right to look at the same data and come to different conclusions. I think he’s wrong, but of such matters are Great Debates made. That’s not a hijack from the topic that **badchad** set; it’s groundwork for my answer. Because nothing is quite so obvious to me as that one’s evaluations of whether God, a god, gods, the Invisible Pink Unicorn, or anything else in the general category of “the supernatural” exists, is a **subjective** judgment. When someone says, “It’s obvious that…”, the only thing that’s obvious to me is that whatever comes after the “that” is very likely to be a conclusion the someone has drawn that is at minimum debatable, a subjectively held judgment. I’ve never been happy with **badchad** , not because he challenges me, but because his style has always seemed to me to be one of trolling. I’m beginning to get a better handle on where he’s coming from, and will be glad to change that judgment of his motives to something much more favorable, as this discussion progresses – assuming that there are grounds to do so, of course! 🙂 Now, to the key points. First, to me Christianity is about **trust**. The proper word for that is, of course, “faith” – but that’s a slippery term. For a Rationalist, it means, “something you think or hope is true that you don’t **know** is.” For a Dogmatist, it means “a body of doctrinal assertions.” I intend to mean neither of these. If I have faith in someone or something, it means I put trust in it. And the God in whom I have trust, faith, is for me a Person. A somewhat elusive Person to know, but one Whom I’ve encountered and believe that I can trust. I would love to know the context of the quote from me that is **badchad** ’s signature, but I expect it fits in well here. When you trust someone, you put your confidence in that person despite any apparent negatives. A couple in a happy marriage trust their spouses to be the persons whom they married, to be someone they can each be sure of. Likewise with a friendship, a healthy _in loco parentis_ relationship – really, the gamut of human relationships. To advert to my example above, **Bricker** trusts President Bush and his supporters; I don’t. That is why we bring different subjective evaluations to the Diebold, Ohio, Florida, etc. data that keep being brought forward by people opposed to the Bush Administration. When I say “rationalize,” I’m not investing it with positive or negative connotations. **Everyone** builds a worldview with which they can feel comfortable based on their own subjective interpretations of the data available. **badchad** ’s, **Diogenes** ’s, **kanicbird** ’s, and my own worldviews are all extensions from basic principles we cherish, whether that be the assurance of science and reason seeing through superstition or divine miraculous events. In that sense, we all rationalize – we all construct comfortable explanations of what UFO sightings, accounts of Aphrodite appearing to random Greek hero, the Resurrection, the JFK assassination, Tropical Storm Beryl, and whatever else confronts our consciousness, really are. It means that we have preconstructed pigeonholes into which to tentatively assign a sighting of a Loch Ness Monster, the Virgin Mary miraculously healing a broken leg in San Mejorquenada, Mexico, Condi Rice’s latest press release, and a tornado sighted over Oklahoma. If you consider, **badchad** , that I mean I’m intentionally deluding myself, or allowing myself to willfully fall into a delusive state, my use of “rationalization” was intended to be completely the opposite: I am honest enough with myself, and have enough intellectual integrity, to recognize that I **could** be fooling myself, and to examine my worldview for possible error. More shortly, in more direct response to your OP. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/36 "2006-07-23T16:56:19Z")
> [@badchad](#): > > And here comes Diogenes, right on cue, with his Jesus didn’t talk of hell speech. He didn’t…that is, he is not alleged to have done so by the Gospels. > [@](#): > > Yes, Diogenes I know you believe that. Belief has nothing to do with it. The meaning of the original Greek is not my _opinion_. > [@](#): > > Having watched you debate the issue with me and many others over the years I can’t help but get an image of plugging holes in a dike but running out of fingers and screaming allegory to Lazarus’ rich friend tormented by flame. The Lazarus Parable makes reference to “Hades” and to the “Bosom of Abraham.” The Bosom of Abraham was a part of _Sheol_/Hades. As I said before, there came to be some later, Greek-influenced conceptions in Judaism that the underworld (the TEMPORARY underworld) was divided into “good” parts and “bad” parts. The distinction from Christian Hell is that this underworld was not eternal. It’s not allegory, it reflects a real belief, just not the one you think it does. > [@](#): > > Unless you have changed since we last spoke, you think Christ just murders souls Hitler style. I don’t think “Christ” exists at all, nor do I believe that Jesus ever claimed to be God or set himself up as a judge. > [@](#): > > While I disagree with your assessment, I did mention the killing of souls rather than the torturing of souls as one of the contingencies. All right, then. Is there some reason why the annihilation of my soul is anything I should care about or want to avoid? ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/37 "2006-07-23T17:34:02Z")
I am not going to address the “second coming” bit at all. There have been “Christ figures” – people who, in real life or fiction, have died in a manner that works a major change in people – throughout history. I had a very strong feeling that this young man would fall into that role based on his adolescence, but have never heard anything more of him. And yeah, I played that up for all it was worth, and you were right to call me on it. As for the “telepathy” thing, though, for once we were 100% on the same side, and you don’t seem to realize that. In that case, recounting my “telepathic experiences” with my ward was in making the point that oftentimes “supernatural” experiences have a very natural explanation – in this case, his and my knowing each other’s motivations, thought processes, and such well enough that the slightest clue would provide a clear insight into the other’s thoughts. > [@](#): > > I really don’t think that is why I irritate you. Perhaps I am wrong, but I truly think it is that historically I had been persistent in my criticism, when other atheists who have debated you had not been. That, and (what I perceive as) the fact that you do a very good job of making a poor theological argument sound very palatable to those not gifted with the best reasoning skills, and I do a better than average job of revealing that regardless of how well you dress up a poor argument, it is still a poor argument. The two combined, along with my familiarity with the bible, I think you find most disconcerting Perhaps. I set a lot of store by civility, though, and your “persistence” seemed to others than me to verge on obsessive stalking. As for the quality of the theology, though, let’s let others be the judge. If I didn’t believe I had the right of it, I wouldn’t be arguing it; if you didn’t believe my arguments to be weak, you’d be agreeing with me, not attacking my arguments. So clearly we need to have third-party judgment on that. For the “What did Jesus _really_ talk about?” question, I’ll ask you, **badchad** , to set me some examples of what in particular you allude to. He said a lot of things, presuming we can rely on the Gospels for a reasonable picture of who and what He was, said, and did – and I’ll suggest that we assume we can so rely, for the sake of argument, until and unless it becomes necessary to get into textual criticism to discuss this fruitfully. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/38 "2006-07-23T17:40:23Z")
I am not going to address the “second coming” bit at all. There have been “Christ figures” – people who, in real life or fiction, have died in a manner that works a major change in people – throughout history. I had a very strong feeling that this young man would fall into that role based on his adolescence, but have never heard anything more of him. And yeah, I played that up for all it was worth, and you were right to call me on it. As for the “telepathy” thing, though, for once we were 100% on the same side, and you don’t seem to realize that. In that case, recounting my “telepathic experiences” with my ward was in making the point that oftentimes “supernatural” experiences have a very natural explanation – in this case, his and my knowing each other’s motivations, thought processes, and such well enough that the slightest clue would provide a clear insight into the other’s thoughts. > [@](#): > > I really don’t think that is why I irritate you. Perhaps I am wrong, but I truly think it is that historically I had been persistent in my criticism, when other atheists who have debated you had not been. That, and (what I perceive as) the fact that you do a very good job of making a poor theological argument sound very palatable to those not gifted with the best reasoning skills, and I do a better than average job of revealing that regardless of how well you dress up a poor argument, it is still a poor argument. The two combined, along with my familiarity with the bible, I think you find most disconcerting Perhaps. I set a lot of store by civility, though, and your “persistence” seemed to others than me to verge on obsessive stalking. As for the quality of the theology, though, let’s let others be the judge. If I didn’t believe I had the right of it, I wouldn’t be arguing it; if you didn’t believe my arguments to be weak, you’d be agreeing with me, not attacking my arguments. So clearly we need to have third-party judgment on that. For the “What did Jesus _really_ talk about?” question, I’ll ask you, **badchad** , to set me some examples of what in particular you allude to. He said a lot of things, presuming we can rely on the Gospels for a reasonable picture of who and what He was, said, and did – and I’ll suggest that we assume we can so rely, for the sake of argument, until and unless it becomes necessary to get into textual criticism to discuss this fruitfully. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/39 "2006-07-23T17:45:43Z")
> [@badchad](#): > > Wow, I take it that’s the best you can do. 😉 Well, no, but the exchange was little more than “my philosopher can beat up _your_ philosopher”, so I went with a punchy zing rather than a pointless extended debate over how much each of us likes our guy and how brave each of them is, etc. Anyway, Michael Shermer agrees with me, so I’m confident one can be an atheist _and_ civil to those that aren’t. ---
**Author:** ![baronsabato](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ed655f/32.png) [@baronsabato](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/baronsabato)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2006, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454/40 "2006-07-23T21:10:55Z")
You know, badchad, you seem to think you know quite a lot about what Christians believe and in particular, liberal Christians. How much experience have you had with liberal Christians outside of this message board? You obviously know a lot about what Polycarp, in particular, believes, but he is actually more of a traditionalist on most matters than most liberal Christians I know. If you’ve read some books by liberal Christian scholars, such as [Marcus Borg](http://www.united.edu/portrait/compare.shtml), you’ll see that many of your perceptions are in error. For example, all of the liberal Christians I know accept modern scholarship as a means to inform our readings of the Bible, and feel that what Borg calls a Historical/Metaphorical reading can be far more illuminating. In that light, we see find that passages condemning homosexuality and rejecting modern science can be (and often, should be) interpreted in ways that a literal reading would not allow. Thus, very few liberal Christians I know believe in a hell in the traditional sense of the word. In fact, Diogenes’s explanation of “Gehenna” is nothing new to me- it was something I learned during Adult Christian Education classes at church. For more information on how many Christians understand “hell” nowadays, you can try reading this [page](http://www.godweb.org/hell.htm) by a Presbyterian minister. Also, while there is definitely some diversity of opinion, most liberal Christians I know do not necessarily believe that God breaks the laws of physics and biology every so often to prove himself. This does not mean we believe in the clockmaker God of the Deists; rather, we believe that God is such a constant presence in this world that He does not need to break any rules to make Himself known to us. Thus, many liberal Christians don’t believe in a physical bodily _resuscitation_- that is, Jesus’ corpse was reanimated and brought back to life, which is an unbiblical position anyway- but that the resurrection was a spiritual event in the lives of the early followers of the Way, an event where the living Jesus was experienced even though he had died. The point is, for liberal Christians, the Bible is indeed a lens by which we see God, but it’s not the _only_ lens. I believe that’s where you misunderstand most liberal Christian positions. If indeed the Bible were the only way we can know God- and many fundamentalists may suggest as much- then yes, a non-literal reading may not work out very well. However, I don’t know of any liberal/mainline Christians who think this is true. Most will say that God can be known in many ways, through the Bible, through prayer, through personal discernment and conscience. After all, Jesus extols us to love God with all our heart, soul, and _mind_. Faith for us is an important thing. It’s wrong of you to say we don’t have enough faith in God, and that’s why we have to go cherry picking rather than reading everything very literally and rejecting anything science or historical scholarship has to offer us. Rather, we have too much faith to invent nonsense like “Creation science” to prove to ourselves that God exists. Our concept of faith is not the very modern idea of ‘believing that God is real’ but rather about how much trust we choose to put in God and the Spirit. Anyway, Christianity is far more diverse than you seem to think, and Polycarp, as much as I admire him, does not necessarily represent all liberal Christians. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/biblical-liberalism-2006/365454.md?page=3)