xiii. religion - Charley Kohlhase

XIII. RELIGION
“My own mind is my church.”
Thomas Paine
There may, or may not, be a supreme entity who (or which) created the universe
and all that is in it. Thus far, the issue can only be a matter of faith. Belief in a greater
power (or an amazing universe) may help people live a life of higher integrity, but they
must resist religious fanaticism which often leads to social dysfunction and war. Religions
whose beliefs harm Earth or its creatures must modify those beliefs -- an obvious example
being the Catholic Church's opposition to birth control. The biosphere is being rapidly
destroyed by the growing human population, and this must be corrected. If a supreme
entity does exist, it does not appear to respond to prayer or intervene for worthy causes,
even allowing myriad tragic injustices to occur every second on Earth. The entity would
appear to either not exist or not care. Yet it is difficult to believe that the universe just
happened by time and chance, so finely tuned appear its physical laws and the diversity
of its creations. So believe in a creator if you will, but live an ethical life in either case. If
forced to take a position, I am ambivalent between the state of no supreme being and a
chance universe vs possibly one which may have started the universe as a great
experiment, allowing evolution to provide creatures with varying degrees of free will to
shape their own destinies. In this chapter, we will explore many different religions and
finally discuss the chances for the Christian god’s existence.
The evolution of free will would presumably make an experiment more interesting
to the creator, perhaps rendering it unable to achieve more than just statistical
predictions of the future, as the full spectrum from good to evil unfolds before its gaze.
This supreme entity may even provide occasional timeline “adjustments” in the unfolding
of the universe and in the ultimate evolution of humankind. Was the introduction of
Christ or Mohammed or Buddha one of these flight-path corrections? Before proceeding
further, however, we must deal with a mundane matter. How should I refer to this putative
creator throughout the rest of this chapter? If compared to the supreme being claimed in
the Christian bible, then God with a capital G is in order, and its sex would be male, as in
“He created Earth in x days and y nights,” etc. But what if the creator is female, or perhaps
without sex such as the entire electromagnetic spectrum? In the Preface, anticipating this
issue, I had suggested “hoh” as a universal substitute for he, she, him, her, or it. My first
draft took this approach until I soon realized that most readers would be annoyed by
“Hoh created the …” And of course there may be no god at all. It really bugs me to give in
to convention, but I don’t wish to annoy readers. So I will reluctantly use God, god, he,
his, him, etc. But please know that this male-father-figure jargon is definitely a
scientifically unwarranted convenience.
“Was there a creator?” If the answer is no, then nearly 90% of the people are
barking up the wrong tree. If the answer is yes, then there are at least two general
possibilities. Either the creator and his motives are totally unknown to us, or the creator
has spoken through one or more of the prophets. Most scientists believe that the creation
of the universe was a chance event -– while most non-scientists believe that the creator
they call God has made his wishes known to the people of Earth. If there was a creator,
why did he do it? Was it really just a great experiment, or is there a more focused
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purpose? Is the creator involved in adjusting the course of the universe’s unfolding path
from time to time? Or does he just watch without emotion (insensitive to untold suffering)
as his physical laws grind out our future? Will humans ever reach a state of knowledge
and technology that gives them the power to shape the future at cosmological levels? We
are certainly shaping Earth’s future by destroying the natural environment. Applying
chaos theory, we must therefore be shaping the universe as well, albeit at a miniscule level
-– for the moment.
I have spent most of my adult life without contemplating these questions or
appreciating the many religions now flourishing on Earth, and must therefore use much of
this chapter to first understand and summarize the various beliefs. There is a large
support base for the God referred to in the Christian Bible, hence I must follow some of
those stories to see if they are logically believable. Eventually, I plan to arrive at my own
RS (rocket scientist, per the Preface) position on these matters at the end of this chapter -–
hopefully before I die. Before we take on this Goliath called religion, however, please note
that I have no major preconceived biases here. Like many people, I find the hard evidence
for God problematical, while the beauty and extent of the universe, from the macroscopic
to the microscopic, are compelling for belief in a greater power. But why should the
Biblical creator of the universe be so
insecure as to need such commandments
as, “Thou shalt have no other gods before
me”; or “Thou shalt not make unto thee
any graven image?” He also seems too
quick to punish those who stray and too
callous to prevent great suffering even
among the good creatures.
For most of my young life from
about age 8 to 18, I was saturated by
religious teachings, initially at the First
Baptist Church of Chattanooga, Tennessee,
and later by attending McCallie Military
Anna’s hummingbird and HST image of Network
Academy, where I studied the Bible from
Nebula, courtesy author (bird) and NASA (nebula).
cover to cover -– two or three times. The
fire-and-brimstone minister Rev. Carl Gears nearly drowned me in 1947 when he bent me
backwards under the water during a Baptismal ceremony, so the reader might logically
assume that I am a bible-belt convert. Not so, however, for once I entered Georgia Tech to
study science, I ceased regular church attendance and recitation of dogma. Thus, the early
right-brain (RB) feeding gave way to left-brain (LB) reasoning, balancing out the situation
nicely. It is only now, more than half a century later, that I have decided to dig into the
matter to reach a more considered conclusion.
There are several questions that all religions have sought to answer for millennia.
Does one supreme being exist who created the universe and all that is in it? If the answer
is yes, does that being (or power) allow us the freedom to choose, or are we all
predestined to live out our lives in a set manner known only to that being? Is there life
after death? If so, is that life spent forever in “heaven” or “hell” (based upon whether we
have led “good” or “evil” lives), spent somewhere else (without regard to our conduct), or
repeated over and over again through reincarnation on Earth in many different forms? If
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reincarnation does exist, is it possible to break free from it, reaching a state of nirvana?
And so go the endless questions which humans have pondered over the millennia.
At the outset, my views are poised between the two ends of a balance. The strongest
single argument for the existence of a supreme being lies in the finely tuned set of
physical laws that allowed the universe to unfold and life to evolve and contemplate its
situation, as I am doing here. Is that supreme being the God referred to in the Christian
Bible? It is here that the argument seems much weaker for, in all of recorded history, there
is scant scientific evidence, not even one great and unique (to be defined later) fulfilled
prophesy that religious scholars have cited. And you can be sure that, were such proof
available, we would have been richly exposed to it. Yet nearly 90% of the world's
population believes in some type of supreme being, and this fact alone warrants an
examination of the matter. Some religious skeptics doubt that Christ was anything more
than a Christian fiction by the early church, due to lack of extra-Biblical evidence.
However, there is a short passage from Falvius Josephus, the first-century reliable Jewish
historian, noting that Jesus was a wise man, teacher, and doer of startling deeds. He also
noted that Jesus was crucified and attracted a large posthumous following called
Christians.
When dates are cited in various religious texts, some authors continue to use the BC
(before Christ) and AD (in the year of our lord) convention, though one could easily argue
for the epoch of some other great prophet such as Buddha
(real name Siddhartha Gautama), who lived half a millennium
before Christ in northern India -- or Muhammad, the great
Arabian prophet who lived some six centuries after Christ. To
get around this problem, I will follow the convention of many
other current authors who have adopted BCE for “Before
Common Era,” and simply CE for “Common Era.” In this usage
CE does, in fact, begin with the birth of Christ, but at least it
appears less overtly tied to one particular religion over
another.
A recent poll taken within the United States indicated
that 40% of adults believe that the world will end in the great
battle of Armageddon, with Jesus doing battle against the
Large oil painting of Christ
Antichrist, whom one person in five believes is walking about
and other figures in time,
on the Earth today. An equal number of people believe that
by Pa Thompson, c. 1920
Christ will come while they are still alive, with the most
favored date for his second coming and end of the present world being 2033 CE (two
millennia following the crucifixion and claimed resurrection of Christ). Who is this
Antichrist, the supposed secret accomplice of Satan? Scholars have suggested such
previous candidates as Hitler, Stalin, and Napoleon, but they all died. Living possibilities
once included Gorbachev and the Pope. To the people at Apple Computer, Bill Gates might
be a candidate. This is all pretty far-out stuff. Maybe it’s Osama bin Laden or George W.
Bush. Or perhaps some scumbag lawyer who wields a lot of power. Johnnie Cochran could
always play the race card and beat Jesus in the last grand trial of Earth. Sorry, reader, I
must regain control of myself. If Christ is the son of God, he will certainly prevail. And
besides, as long as people do evil deeds, one could always argue for the Antichrist as a
concept, even if such a being has never existed.
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I look forward to this journey, for I wonder how it will all shake out after I have
followed the trail (pretty cold by now) for leads. It will also be a journey requiring the
utmost cooperation between LB (left brain) and RB (right brain), the former collecting the
pieces and the latter synthesizing them into a reasonable overview. In attempting to
research both printed books and the electronic media, I was totally overwhelmed by the
enormous volume of material on religion. Much of it rambles on and on with lengthy
recitation, devoid of true analysis, but there are also many nuggets to be found with
patience. Regrettably, I am often impatient, endeavoring to quickly reach the "bottom
line" (a nearly impossible task for religion). If I step upon some of your most fervent
beliefs, please forgive me, as no harm was intended. I am merely one rocket scientist
expressing his own thoughts about the matter.
I am also constantly on the lookout for scientific evidence. For example, what do the
Dead Sea Scrolls or the Shroud of Turin imply? Has Noah's Ark ever been found? If not, is
there other strong evidence for the great flood? Were there reliable witnesses to the
recorded resurrection of Christ or to the parting of the Red Sea? Are there places where
the sick are always healed? Is there evidence for reincarnation? What about "near-death"
experiences? Will the evolutionary vs creationist debate ever be silenced? Were there
unique prophesies (even one) that came true? Do the physical laws that govern the
evolving universe imply a supreme being at the helm? Some scientists say that minute
adjustments to these laws would have led to a universe without us –- while other scientists
assert that we merely live in one of many random universes that happened to work. The
totality of these laws may not be deduced by pure thought, as Aristotle believed, but will
likely require experimental evidence, an area in which human scientists are evolving
rapidly. As no one can yet prove God's existence, one of my goals will be to use
Bayesian probability theory to estimate the probability of God's existence -- which is done
at the end of this chapter.
It is nearly impossible to locate solid, scientifically defensible evidence that truly
answers key questions that are linked to the fundamental questions that religion seeks to
learn. For example, either Noah's Ark has been discovered or it has not. If it has and if the
evidence is solid, many PBS and other reliable documentary programs would have covered
such an incredible story from every angle imaginable. As I can recall no such convincing
coverage, I can only assume that the evidence for its discovery is too weak to bear much
scrutiny. Analogous to the UFO issue (which itself has been around for nearly four
centuries), where are the great photos or pieces from any of these craft? Nonetheless, I
hope to follow an objective, unbiased examination as we wind our way through this
chapter. Incidentally, is it any more incredible to believe in a supreme being than to
accept that the universe began in a happenstance Big Bang, a microscopic point of
transparent, nearly infinite potential in primordial space-time, which sent the cosmos
hurtling outward at enormous speeds, giving rise to all that exists in the 200 billion
galaxies, each having 200 billion stars and untold planets?
As many of you know, the Jehovah’s Witnesses are an “endtime community” who
believe that the end of the world – which they call Harmageddon – will occur soon,
followed by paradise. They are a devoted religious sect bearing witness for their belief in
God and Jesus, and whose message is frequently conveyed, door to door, by nice young
followers happy to keep you supplied with copies of the Watchtower, their primary
pamphlet. The sect evolved (eventually) from The Watchtower and Tract Society founded
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in 1884 by the reverend Charles Taze Russell, who lectured on Biblical prophesy. Russell
believed that the spirit of Jesus had come to Earth in 1874 to rule for 1,000 years. After
Russell’s death in 1916, his devotees split, with some following Judge Joseph F.
Rutherford, who coined the term Jehovah's Witnesses in the 1930s. Today the religion
claims 6,000,000 members worldwide in 232 countries.
Unfortunately for the Witnesses, their many predicted dates for
Harmageddon over the past century have all passed without
incident, yet they still manage to keep the faith.
After the umpteenth time of being offered another copy of
the Watchtower, and not wishing to be rude, I began inviting the
young Witnesses at my front door to answer a question. If I deemed
their answer worthy, I would invite them in and listen to their spiel.
If their answer was inadequate, then I would politely invite them to
Charles T. Russell, c
move on to the next house. The question is based upon the cited
1900, credit N/A
merciful God, who loves and wants the little children to come unto
him, etc. Consider a small child, perhaps only 1-2 years old, who is crawling across the
family’s sloping driveway when the emergency brake on the old pickup truck releases,
causing the truck to roll over the child and cripple it for life. “How,” I ask the young
Witnesses, “can a merciful God allow this to happen?” The child has not likely committed
any sins in its short life (unless we are all born sinners, a rather harsh initial condition).
The Witnesses typically offer only three levels of answers, but I will add two more of
my own. Level-1 is that “God moves in mysterious ways.” As a scientist, this just doesn’t
do it for me, being a non-answer. Level-2 is that “God has chosen this crisis as a way of
bringing the family together emotionally, to rally around the crippled child.” Now I don’t
know about you, reader, but a God who can create the universe must surely be able to
find some other technique for bringing the family together than by allowing an innocent
child to be crippled for life. The Level-3 answer presumes that God had planned to take
proper care of Adam, Eve, and all of their descendants, throughout eternity … as long as
they all obeyed his orders. However, as soon as Eve used her “free will” to commit the first
sin in the Garden of Eden, then God told the first pair that they were on their own from
that point on. This would of course result in the full range of good to evil and of comfort
to suffering. Incredibly harsh, for simply taking a bite out of an apple. This God seems
small minded, but I suppose the Level-3 answer is better than the first two answer levels.
Let’s move on to Level-4, which sort of works if you believe in reincarnation. In this
scenario, the child’s spirit previously inhabited the body of an evil person, like Hitler or
Jack the Ripper, or whomever. And the punishment for that past life of evil is now being
administered to the child inheriting that spirit. Okay, but wouldn’t God have been more
just to have punished the evil doer at the time? Seems a bit harsh to me. Seems a little like
those folks who punish their pets long after the infringement has occurred. By the way, as
long as the world population continues expanding at an exponential rate, there will always
be more births than deaths, so that reincarnation has a shortfall of new bodies to inhabit –
leaving the being in charge of reincarnation with the choice of either putting clones of the
same reincarnated spirit in multiple bodies, or of supplying many of these new bodies
with brand new, untarnished spirits heralding from no past lives. That would be the fair
thing to do, but perhaps God is not fair.
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Moving on to Level-5, this answer only works if you believe that a supreme being
created the universe and all that it contains by devising an ingenious set of physical laws
from which all matter and energy would form, with some of it evolving into myriad forms
of life, including of course humans able to contemplate these great questions. If this
magnificent act of creation was done as an entertaining experiment to stave off boredom
for the creator, then he might well simply observe its unfolding, allowing the eventual
evolution of free will to prevent his knowing the future absolutely … but only statistically.
In that scenario, he would perhaps not attempt to prevent great injustices and suffering,
wishing not to tamper with his experiment. This might also explain why studies have
shown that God does not respond to prayer. The John Templeton Foundation funded a
$2.4 million study to get at this question, and the results were published in early 2006.
Researchers from six academic medical centers divided 1802 patients (recovering from
coronary-bypass surgery) into three groups – the patients in two groups were told they
may or may not receive prayer, and those in a third group were told they would receive
regular prayer for a better recovery. About half of the patients in the first two groups had
problems during recovery (usually atrial fibrillation). Surprisingly, group three did the
worst, with nearly 60% having problems. The devout would say that God does not like
being tested, and adopted a hands-off approach. But I suspect the studies were valid.
At the end of this chapter, I also plan to analyze the interesting views expressed by
Dr. Deepak Chopra in his highly acclaimed book How to Know God, published in 2000.
Among the book’s highly supportive reviewers are the Dalai Lama, Larry King, Mikhail
Gorbachev, Robert Thurman, and Andrew Weil. Chopra believes that God does exist and
that a “transition zone” exists between the God world and the human world where
interactions can and do occur. Chopra believes that God’s greatest secrets are hidden
within the human brain, and consist of such states as ecstasy, love, grace, and mystery, to
name a few. He believes that the unfolding of a true awareness of God is made possible by
our brain’s ability to unfold its own potential, and that the soul is the culmination of our
evolution to find God. He believes that God is our highest instinct to know ourselves, and
that this knowledge will allow “the force to be with us” in all that we do. Does Chopra
make a strong case for God, or can a rebuttal be made that we just “make up God in our
minds” by appreciating the miraculous universe, from quarks to hummingbirds to
galaxies? You may be the judge of this, but it was disappointing that Chopra’s email box
[askdeepak.com] never responded to the few serious questions I posed.
The Many Faiths
The many religious faiths on this planet fall broadly under the categories of the
Abrahamic, the Vedic, and the Others. The Abrahamic faiths, consisting of Judaism,
Christianity, and Islam generally believe in a supreme God and one life after death, the
quality of which is determined by whether a person has led a "good" or an "evil" life. If
good, you get to spend eternity in “heaven.” If evil, you spend eternity in “hell.” The
Vedic faiths, on the other hand, tend to believe in reincarnation in successive lives in an
ever-changing universe. These religions consist of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism. The
Vedic faiths view all life as cyclical, the universe as eternal. The "Other" faiths consist of
Sikhism, Shintoism, Taoism, Baha'i (which has many of the Abrahamic views), Shamanism,
Confucianism, Sufism, Freemasonry, Zoroastrianism, numerous tribal religions, various
scientific pantheisms, and many more.
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Some scholars believe that there are only two “mother religions,” namely Judaism
and Hinduism. From the former came Christianity and Islam. From the latter came
Buddhism and Jainism. The remaining religions evolved variously from these in ways that
followed some of their tenets, but in other ways that developed their own unique beliefs.
This chapter can only summarize the highlights of several, but by no means all, of these
rich religions, but it is hoped that the reader will be motivated to continue his or her
research into those aspects of particular religions found both interesting and
inspirational. All of the religions have a master teacher or prophet figure to help guide
their followers in leading honorable and compassionate lives. There are many similarities,
but there are also many differences.
The Jewish people descended from Issac, legitimate son of Abraham and Sarah,
while the Muslim people descended from Ishmael, the illegitimate son of Abraham and his
housemaid Hagar. Could this have seeded the eternal hate between the Jews and the
Arabs, a state that appears permanent to the rest of us, with “peace accords” never
lasting? Recent DNA-based research has substantiated the genetic link (a shared Y
chromosome) between Jews and Arabs. The conflict seems eternal over Jerusalem and the
greater area extending from the Mediterranean Sea to the Jordan River. Boundary lines
divide East and West Jerusalem, with the four-sectioned old city on the boundary. There
one finds the Muslim, Jewish, Christian, and Armenian Quarters. West Jerusalem
neighborhoods are primarily Jewish, with those in East Jerusalem primarily Palestinian.
Within the old city are such sacred monuments as the Western Wall (holiest site for Jewish
prayer), Little Wall (where Orthodox Jews pray in an Arab neighborhood), Temple Mount
(36-acre site of earlier Jewish temples; also place where Muhammad rose to heaven on a
horse), Church of the Holy Sepulchre (where Christ rose from the dead), Tower of David,
and the Mount of Olives.
Jerusalem means “city of peace,” but tensions in that area are always on edge. In
October of 2000, a group of militant Palestinians demolished Joseph’s Tomb, a Jewish holy
site, trashing the Hebrew texts stored inside. Chanting “Allahu akbar,” meaning “God is
great,” while several victorious Palestinians fired their M-16 rifles into the air in
celebration of their act of “liberation.” To most of us Westerners, the Middle East is
teeming with religious crazies. The Christian Bible mentions Jerusalem’s name 667 times,
so its deep meaning to the local faiths is well established. For Christians, Jerusalem is
where the messiah came 2,000 years ago to take on the world’s sins and be resurrected.
For Muslims, it is the third holiest place after Mecca and Medina, as Muhammad directed
Muslims to also bow for prayer towards Jerusalem. For Jews, who are by far the largest of
the faiths represented in the Jerusalem area, there
are the promised-land implications and the hope
that the messiah will return one day to rebuild
their great temple which was destroyed in 70 CE
by the Romans.
Jews believe that dying in Jerusalem assures
them of forgiveness. In modern times, the city
derives much of its revenue from tourism when
peace seems safe. But there is corruption within
the Palestinian Authority, and the threat of
conflict is ever present. The Bible even predicts
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Modern day Jerusalem, circa 1990s
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that Armageddon, in the form of World War III, will occur somewhere in the Middle East.
This makes much of the rest of the world very nervous. One wonders whether born-againBush’s invasion of Iraq was/is playing with that prophesy. Poverty and lack of change
fuels the anger in the streets. The per-capita GNP in the West Bank and Gaza Strip is less
than 10% of Israel’s annual figure of about $20,000, with Muslim unemployment at 30%.
Residents need permission slips to leave this sliver of land for better jobs in Israel. Many
point to the modern houses for their Palestinian officials, with only refugee camps and
slum areas for most of the masses. The Palestinians are angry with Israel, whose military
presence has prevented them from attaining independence. The United Nations would like
to have the city internationalized and under its authority, but this has not occurred.
All of these issues are good reasons for us to understand the world’s religions, even
if we fail to resolve the great questions. One simple question has always puzzled me,
however. When Moses led the people of Israel out of Egypt to the “promised land” (then
known as Canaan, but later renamed Palestine), how is it that the Muslims (Arabs) now
occupy that area and call themselves Palestinians? Isn’t it ironic that the illegitimate race
descending from Abraham and Hagar now occupies the area God intended for his
promised and legitimate Jewish descendents from Abraham and Sarah? The Arabs and the
Jews seem to have plenty of reasons to dislike each other. I have always thought that the
U.S. should get on with developing alternative energy sources, stop worrying about oil
from the Middle East, and just let the Jews and Arabs fight until they’ve finally had their
fill of it. Their problems have become a drag, and the rest of the world is tiring of their
eternal conflict. Then again, I can understand why most Muslims hate Americans, with our
meaningless network TV shows, our support for Israel, and our lavish life styles dependent
upon plundering Earth’s natural resources to drive SUVs and fill Wal-Mart, Cosco, and
other retail stores with cheap junk we don’t really need, destined for landfills.
There are numerous variations within the Christian faith, such as the Baptists, the
Methodists, the Presbyterians, the Evangelicals, the Mormons, the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the
Pentecostals, the Holy Rollers, and many more. As there is not space in this chapter to
address more than the major religious headings, we will not delve into these numerous
religious subcategories. A poll published in Life Magazine in December 1998 indicated
that 95% of Americans (and only 70% of Britons) believe in God; 33% believe that the
Bible is the actual word of God; 80% believe in an afterlife (72% in Heaven, and 56% in
Hell); and 79% pray to God and believe that he helps them. Most believe in the legends of
Moses over the past 3,000 years, though there is no solid evidence that he actually
existed. To the Jews, he was Moshe Rabbenu, their master and founder of Judaism. To the
Christians, he was a model of faith. To the Muslims, he was the
first prophet to announce the coming of Muhammad. It is
important to understand the world’s major religions and their
beliefs before attempting to shed any light and opinions on
the great questions they all raise.
I suppose that Hare Krishna falls in the broad category
of “other religions.” Many of us have seen the white-suited
Hare Krishna followers,
folks at major airport terminals asking for contributions, but
illustration credit N/A
never knowing exactly how that money is used. Today
(6/12/2000) I saw a newspaper article that described why 44 young students of Hare
Krishna boarding schools were suing the leaders of their religious community for $400
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million. They were alleging years of sexual, physical, and emotional torture. They contend
that this child abuse occurred over two decades at boarding schools in both the U.S. and
India. The federal case has been filed in Dallas, Texas, and names the International Society
of Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) as defendant, along with 17 members of the group’s
governing board and the estate of the founder A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada. We
may be treated to increased collection activities by the Krishna field agents.
Judaism
Abraham is believed to have lived some 1,800 years before the birth of Christ and is
regarded as the father of the Jewish people. Their scriptures describe how God made a
pact with Abraham that assured his descendants would become the “chosen people.” As
part of this agreement, the Jewish people would have to obey God's laws. These laws,
carved into stone tablets, were given to the prophet Moses on the top of Mount Sinai. Most
of us know of the Ten Commandments, but there were more than 600 other laws
(generally enlarging upon the Ten) also prescribed for the Jews to follow. Judaism believes
that God will send a Messiah in the future to gather the Jews once more within their
promised land of Israel. Most Jews view Jesus Christ as an admirable Jew, but not as the
Son of God. However, it is generally accepted that monotheistic Judaism was the
progenitor of both Christianity and Islam.
King David had a son named Solomon, who once built a great Temple in Jerusalem.
It was destroyed and rebuilt many times thereafter,
but one wall of this final temple still remains from
the 2nd century BCE. Known as the “Wailing Wall”
or the “Western Wall,” it is an important place for
Jewish pilgrimage. It is believed that the Ark of the
Covenant was once located beneath the temple in a
room known as the Holy of Holies, but was later
moved and hidden (we will return to this search
later). The Jews believe that one unique,
incorporeal, and eternal God exists, that this God
knows the thoughts and deeds of people, and that
Painting of Solomon’s great temple, circa
this God will reward the good and punish the
960 BCE, illustration credit N/A
wicked. Prayer is to be directed only to this God.
When the Messiah comes, the dead will be resurrected.
The Jewish teachings are all contained in the Hebrew Bible, sometimes referred to
as the “Torah,” kept in the form of hand-written scrolls at all synagogues. The Torah
contains the five “long laws” given to Moses on Mount Sinai by God when the ten
commandments were also provided as the “short law” on stone tablets. Each Torah is kept
in the alcove of that synagogue wall which faces Jerusalem. The role of a rabbi is that of a
"teacher" who oversees the running of each synagogue. The rabbi is able to teach the
study of the Torah and resolve any questions surrounding it. The words of the prophets
are assumed true, but those of Moses carry the greatest weight. The Jewish symbol is the
seven-branch menorah, with the central branch standing for the Sabbath, the day God
rested after creating the universe.
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There are nearly eighteen million Jews in the world today, with about half in North
America, one-third in Israel, and the remainder in Europe and Russia. The last of ancient
Israel was pretty much eradicated when
Jerusalem fell to the Babylonians some six
centuries before the birth of Christ. Judaism does
not subscribe to the Christian belief that all
people inherited "original sin" when Adam and
Eve disobeyed God in the Garden of Eden.
Instead, believers are able to sanctify their lives
by
fulfilling
the
"mitzvot"
(the
divine
commandments) and drawing closer to God.
Although Jews have considered the nature of the
universe, Judaism does not tend to focus on
The Torah and the Menorah, pivotal
abstract cosmological concepts. Instead, actions
Jewish religious symbols, courtesy
are far more important than beliefs. Relationships
Pasadena Jewish Temple and Center
among the Jewish nation, the land of Israel,
mankind, and God matter most. The Torah teaches that the kingdom of Earth, not heaven,
is what really counts. It is sanctifying life with the family and community, every day, that
is most important.
Christianity
With nearly two billion followers worldwide, Christianity is the largest of the
religious groups. Nearly half of these follow the teachings of the Catholic Church. The
other half is comprised of some two dozen different divisions, each formed at different
times, different places, and for different reasons. Christians also believe in one supreme
God, good vs evil, and life after death in heaven or in hell. They believe that God sent his
son Jesus to Earth to help spread the word of God through his prophets. They believe that
Jesus healed people and performed miracles, often in the company of the twelve apostles
who traveled with him. They believe that Jesus was unjustly tried by the Roman governor
Pontius Pilate, executed by crucifixion, later arose from the dead in an event known as the
resurrection, and finally rejoined God in heaven by an ascension.
During and after the life of Jesus on Earth, he went by many different names: Jesus
Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, the Nazarene, Yeshua, Iesus, Issa, Jesus the Messiah, and the Son
of God. Jesus grew up as a Jewish boy and followed the Jewish traditions. A handful of
religious scholars even believe that Jesus fathered children with Mary Magdalene. You
may pursue this further by reading Holy Blood, Holy Grail, by Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln,
published by Dell in 1983. Christians believe in the “Holy Trinity,” consisting of God the
Father, God the Son (Jesus), and God the Holy Spirit. The Christian holy book is called the
Bible, and the Christian symbol is the cross or crucifix. The Bible consists of the Old
Testament, mostly stories told by God to the Jews, and the New Testament, stories told by
actual people who knew Jesus during his lifetime on Earth.
What appears to make Christianity unique is the reported, miraculous resurrection
of Christ. Some religious scholars claim that 500 people witnessed the resurrection. If true,
that is an amazing data point, but how can we be sure of this claim? Scholar Josh
McDowell states, “After more than 700 hours of studying this subject, I have come to the
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conclusion that the resurrection of Jesus Christ is either one of the most wicked, vicious,
heartless hoaxes ever foisted on the minds of human beings -- or it is the most remarkable
fact of history.” My only small input that Christ even existed at all involves a photo that
hung on a wall at McCallie School in the late 1940s and early 1950s. It was reported to
have been taken by a missionary who had lost faith in God. As he prayed for a sign, the
Lord asked him to take a picture of the distant, snow-covered Himalayas. If one stared at
this photo for tens of seconds, a truly fine image of the "long" face of a Christ-like man
popped into view. I was young at the time, and it made quite an impression on me. As an
RS, however, I recognize that, like the “Face on Mars,” one can see almost anything in an
image, given a sufficiently large number of geometric combinations and patterns to
peruse. Nonetheless, I made an extensive search to locate this photograph in the late
1990s, but to no avail. It had simply vanished, and even the older, retired teachers knew
naught of its fate.
Islam
Islam is an Arabic word meaning “to submit,” and a Muslim is a person who follows
the Islamic tenets by submitting to the will of the One True God, often called Allah. Islam
was founded in Medina in 622 CE by Muhammad the Prophet (also a successful trader). At
roughly a billion followers, Islam represents the second largest religion in the world. Most
Muslims live in the Middle East, North Africa, and Indonesia, but numbers are rising in
Europe and the Americas. Muslims believe that Allah is omnipotent and merciful, that
Satan exists to drive people to sin and eventual eternity in Hell, but that submission to
Allah can lead to an eternity in Paradise after death. One can become a Muslim by simply
saying, "There is no god apart from God, and Muhammad is the Messenger of God.” It is
customary to add, “Praise and glory be to Him,” whenever saying Allah or God, but I will
not do so here in the interest of space.
Muslims revere Jesus as the prophet Isa ibn Maryam, but do not believe that he was
executed on the cross, and also tend to regard the deity of Jesus as blasphemous. But even
more than just spiritual in nature, Muslims accept
Islam as a total way of life. The "Five Pillars of
Islam" are faith, prayer, help to the needy, selfpurification, and pilgrimage to the holy city of
Makkah (more popularly known as Mecca). The
Islamic calendar is lunar based and not solar
adjusted. Muslims eat no pig meat and drink no
alcohol. They regularly visit architecturally
interesting buildings known as mosques for both
prayers and other community activities. Muslims
pray five times each day, with the “after-midday”
prayer on every Friday given at the local mosque.
The Large Stone Ka’bah in Makkah (Mecca)
Their other holy city is Medina, and it is expected
that a Muslim will make a pilgrimage to one of the two holy cities every several years, if
able to do so.
Abraham established the original settlement which today is the holy city of Makkah,
and the cube-shaped Ka’bah is the place of worship which God commanded Abraham and
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Ishmael to build some four thousand years ago. The Ka’bah was constructed of stone on
what many believe was the original site of a sanctuary established by Adam. God
commanded Abraham to summon all mankind to visit this place, and when pilgrims go
there today they say, "At the service, O Lord," in response to Abraham's summons. Many
Muslims try to kiss the black stone in the outer wall of the Ka’bah for extra meaning. Even
from distant locations, Muslims are expected to face the direction of the Ka’bah when
praying.
The great document of Islam is known as the Qur'an, whose Arabic words are
believed to have come directly from God as told to Muhammad over the last twenty years
of his life. The Qur'an records the relationship between God and all of his creatures. The
only woman’s name in the entire Qur’an is that of Mary, mother of Jesus. It is said that
Muhammad memorized the entire 114 chapters, dictating them later to companions.
Many cite the Qur'an as a work of incredible, literary excellence, due to both its
mathematical and its poetic nature. The intricate mathematical distribution of letters in
the Qur'an make the words easy to understand and remember. It can be read and enjoyed
over and over again. The Arabic text is even composed in such a manner as to remind the
reader of the next verse, thus providing Muslims with an efficient way for memorizing
many parts of the Qur'an. The visual appearance of the Arabic text is so beautiful that it is
frequently used to adorn buildings.
What Muslims believe about Jesus comes from the Qur’an, not from the New
Testament, which they believe to be tainted by human error. They draw upon their own
traditions, as well as commentaries by experts. They believe
that Jesus was born under a palm tree by a direct act of God.
From the cradle, the infant Jesus proclaims that he is God’s
prophet, but not God’s son. The Muslims believe this as the
Qur’an states that Allah is “above having a son.” Yet a few
things are unique to Jesus that even Muhammad lacked. These
include the fact that both Jesus and his mother Mary were
born untouched by Satan. Also, Jesus could work miracles,
granting him the stature as the Messiah or “anointed one.”
Muslims are only supposed to pray to Allah, but some still ask
Jesus or Mary for favors. Visions of Jesus or Mary have
occurred many times in Muslim countries. Though
Arabic text in the Qur’an
Muhammad superseded Jesus as the last great prophet,
Muhammad must still die, while Jesus does not, per the Qur’an, or at least not until after
he has returned as a Muslim to defeat the anti-Christ when the world ends.
Muslims believe that the earlier messages of Abraham and Jesus were incomplete,
and that only Muhammad received the final and complete words from God. They believe
that their own deaths are predetermined by God, and thus not to be feared. When this is
coupled with their general anti-Western feelings, many become terrorists who are willing
to die in bombings for the Muslim cause. In early 1998, the American CIA and FBI teamed
up in an attempt to "get" Osama bin Laden, head of the Al-Qaeda and believed responsible
for many terrorist bombings. Cruise missiles were launched for one of his hidden camps in
Afghanistan, but bin Laden was not killed. With a personal wealth of 200 million dollars,
he is an elusive target and a major threat.
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Osama bin Laden was interviewed by CNN's Peter Arnett in March of 1997. When
asked why he so despised the United States, he replied, "We declared jihad (Arabic for
struggle or holy war) against the U.S. government, because it is unjust, criminal and
tyrannical. It has committed acts that are hideous and criminal, whether directly or
through its support of the Israeli occupation of the Prophet's Night Travel Land
(Palestine). And we believe the U.S. is directly responsible for those who were killed in
Palestine, Lebanon and Iraq.” He later goes on to say, "The hearts of Muslims are filled
with hatred towards the United States and the American president. The President has a
heart that knows no words. A heart that kills hundreds of children knows no words. In our
religion it is our duty to make jihad so that God's word is the one exalted to the heights
and so that we drive the Americans away from all Muslim countries."
Many of bin Laden's men expressed sadness that so few
Americans (and so many Kenyans) died in the Nairobi bomb
blast. This, of course, leads to increasing resentment by
Americans for people they consider as crazy religious fanatics.
Muslims are only encouraged to defend, never to attack, but
jihad may be declared "defensively" whenever the Muslim
beliefs are “under attack.” We have not seen the last of jihad.
Just as the Jews and the Arabs seem eternally committed to
Taliban fighter who hates
conflict, so the jihad seems predestined to continue. When
America and seeks jihad
Clinton attacked Iraq in December of 1998 because of Saddam
Hussein's failure to allow adequate weapons inspections (or to stop the momentum of the
impeachment vote, depending upon your viewpoint), he absolutely ensured that terrorism
will flourish and endure for many Islamic zealots who seek revenge on the United States.
The Encyclopedia Britannica describes "jihad" as a religious duty imposed on
Muslims to spread Islam by waging war. Jihad has come to denote any conflict waged for
principle or belief and is often translated to mean "holy war.” In Frank Herbert's
outstanding science fiction classic Dune, he writes of the jihad in the same context as the
Islamic meaning. The Dune series was so popular that a Dune Encylopedia was compiled
by Willis McNelly and published by Putnam in 1984. In the novel, Jehanne Butler awoke
from delivery anesthesia to find her baby dead, later discovering the cause to be a selfprograming machine that instituted unjustified abortions. She then became the leader of
the Butlerian Jihad, or revolt, in order to destroy these computers and the beliefs of their
masters. Historians will call "great" those individuals who move the mass of humankind in
a new direction. But let us all hope that any jihad on Earth will be for sound reasons, as
there is much power in such a movement.
Hinduism
Vedic faiths believe that all existence is cyclical, even universes themselves are
capable of destruction and rebirth. "Veda" means scared knowledge in Sanskrit, the oldest
surviving written language of India. Hinduism differs from Christianity and other Western
religions in that it does not have a single founder, a single system of morality, or a
religious organization, but just a large number of scriptures. It does not believe in one
creator or a final day of judgment, but rather in all living things being tiny parts of a
Supreme Entity. As the oldest of the major religions, the roots of Hinduism are traceable
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to the Indus valley civilization around 4000 to 2200 BCE (some scholars say much older),
but its development was influenced by many invasions over thousands of years.
The Persians invaded India during the 6th century BCE and chose the name
Hinduism, meaning “religion of the people living near the Indus River.” In Persian, the
letters H and S are pronounced almost the same, so they mistook the Sind (Sanskrit for the
river Indus) for H and started using the term Hinduism. Early Hinduism stressed
“moksha,” meaning reincarnation and final release. Even the Vedic gods are subject to
rebirth. Buddhism and Jainism also share common roots in the Vedic cultures of ancient
India. To Hindus, India is the Holy Land, with sacred mountains and rivers enlivened by
more than 300,000 local deities.
Hinduism is the world's third largest religion at 730 million,
with most of its believers located in India and Nepal. Sometimes
referred to as Sanatana Dharma, it has no beginning or end, the
eternal faith that is more a code of life than a religion. Anyone
who practices Dharma by searching for the truth can be called a
Hindu. Dharma means to hold, and a Hindu holds on to this inner
law, which leads from ignorance to Truth. Hindus believe that
Jesus traveled to Southeast Asia to meditate before returning
home to become a guru to the Jews. Like Ghandi, many Hindus
Ghandi on 50 Rupees
are attracted to Jesus by his compassion and non-violence -–
virtues taught in their own sacred scriptures. But Hindus find the concept of a single God
too restrictive, with all human beings having the ability to become divine themselves.
Ganesha, the remover of obstacles and lord of beginnings, is one of the most popular of all
Hindu deities and is celebrated by Jains, Buddhists, and many others even outside of
India.
Through reading of the scriptures (shastras) and the teachings of the seers, a Hindu
can find self-awareness. One often sees Hindus practicing yoga which is a mental or bodily
discipline for spiritual purposes. In classical Hinduism, each soul (or atman) can go
through as many as 84,000 reincarnations (rising from lowly insects to humans to
demigods) before achieving reunion with the ultimate nature of all existence. Once freed
of rebirth, one achieves "moksha" (if Hindu or Jain) or "nirvana" (if Buddhist).
The Hindu sacred words are recorded in many different scriptures, with the Veda
being the most ancient of the Sanskrit writings. One of the four scriptures is known as the
Rig Veda and contains a collection of hymns that tell of the Hindu divine beings. The
other three Veda scriptures are the Upanishads, the Puranas, and the Ramayana. The
latter was based on a popular folk story that served as a model for the ideal Hindu life.
One epic scripture is the Mahabharata, the world's longest poem that is said to contain the
tenets of classical Hinduism. Within the Mahabharata is the Bhagavad Gita, comprised of
701 Sanscrit verses and considered the most popular of all Hindu writings, believed to
have been created around the time of Christ. Central to the Gita is the belief that
“attachment is born of ignorance, selfishness, and passion, and brings with it death;
detachment is wisdom and brings with it freedom.” Further discussion of the Veda, the ten
forms of the supreme Vishnu, the Shiva Nataraja (the famous dancing Shiva, surrounded
by flames), and the numerous other Hindu figures is beyond the scope of this summary.
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The law of "karma" is important to Hinduism. It holds that all actions affect the
future (this is certainly true in modern scientific terms, where the death of a tiny butterfly
forever alters the meteorology). Wicked actions produce bad karma, and good actions
produce good karma. The doctrine of karma is based upon the
theory of cause and effect. According to this doctrine, God is not
responsible for the pleasure or pain of his creatures. They suffer or
enjoy in proportion to the consequences of their own bad or good
deeds. Furthermore, the quality of the next reincarnated life
depends upon the way a person has conducted themselves in the
present life. Whether or not this is so, it does help to explain the
otherwise meaningless and cruel injury that can occur to a young
child who has done no evil deeds in their short life.
As the world's population expands, there are more humans
being born than dying. This leads to an interesting mathematical
Bhagavad Gita, credit
situation for the departing souls destined for new bodies. If they
Univ. of Texas
only transferred to other humans, each soul would have to move
into more than one new body. But they can also transfer from and to any of the "lower
creatures" whose numbers may be falling in proportion to the rising numbers of humans
who continue to eliminate wilderness lands in their insatiable quest for "usable" land to
develop. What if the total number of creatures on Earth is staying about the same, but just
shifting to a larger human share? Actually, the point is moot, as the Hindu writings allow
the departing soul to take more than one birth at the same time, but these same writings
also allow both "high" and "low" status recipients. That seems to pose a problem. The
direction of one’s rebirth is clear if your karma is decidedly good or bad, but what must
you have done to ever see it split between higher and lower rebirths?
Why does a person reincarnate? Hindu dharma says that the unfulfilled desires of
departed people are responsible for their rebirth. Only by breaking free of these selfish
wishes can one break the cycle of rebirth. From an inner standpoint, the soul's happiness
is the suffering of the ego, and the ego's happiness the suffering of the soul. Ultimately, we
must go beyond all karma, good or evil. The greatest virtue does not seek to change the
world or improve ourselves, but to rest in harmony with the peace of what is. Less evolved
souls may only experience a prolonged sleep between incarnations. These souls are said to
be reborn into the same area on Earth and seek a similar life as before. Very advanced
souls may enter into a deep trance and reincarnate quickly. Souls of intermediate
development may spend time on various "astral planes" to assimilate their life experience.
It would seem that the predestination concept is incompatible with that of the
karma doctrine (and vice versa). Hindu dharma, however, has found a way to allow both.
The argument is a bit complex, but basically the situation can only occur when the self has
reached such a pure state that it is truly in the hands of God from that point on. When a
person dies, his gross physical body is left behind, and the soul with the subtle body
(consisting of the mind, intellect, sense organs, motor organs, and vital energies) goes to a
different plane of existence. Such a plane of existence is called "loka" in Sanskrit. After the
soul has finally broken free from endless rebirth, Hindus say that it has joined the
“Brahman,” the spirit or energy that sustains the universe.
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Hinduism has 16 "samskaras" or rituals associated with rites of passage. When a
Hindu dies, his final samskara involves certain acts just before the soul leaves the body.
Placed into the mouth of the body, prior to cremation, are a few drops of water from the
sacred river Ganges, leaves from the sacred tulasi plant, and a small piece of gold. A
mantra is chanted, the pyre is lit, and prayers are made to give the departing soul peace.
Incidentally, the Hindu symbol, rather than visual, is actually represented by the sound
“Aum,” believed to be the first sound ever made. After only ashes remain, these are
collected and scattered on the Ganges or on some other sacred body of water.
Buddhism
Buddhism was founded in northern India (today, southern Nepal) in the 6th
century BCE by a Sakya prince named Siddhartha Gautama, who came to be called The
Buddha, or the “Enlightened One.” At the age of 29, he renounced his royal heritage,
donned a simple yellow garb, and left his wife and son in order to “seek the truth.” It was
not uncommon in those times for a man to leave his family and lead the life of an ascetic.
He worried about sickness, aging, and death. He sought to escape the endless cycle of
birth, death, and rebirth that led to suffering. He believed that the world's problems
stemmed from a fundamental ignorance that prevented people from understanding the
true nature of reality, causing them to engage in actions that could not bring them true
happiness.
There are many similarities between Gautama and Christ. Both were born to chaste
women without sexual intercourse. Both left home for the wilderness where they were
tempted by a Satan figure. Both returned enlightened, worked miracles, and challenged
the religious establishment by their teachings. Both attracted disciples and taught
compassion and unselfishness. But there are also differences. Christ suffered an agonizing
death by crucifixion, but the Buddha’s death was serene and controlled, a calm passing
like the gradual extinction of a flame. A Christian cannot become Christ, but a serious
Buddhist can, in theory, achieve Buddhahood.
Today there are about 315 million Buddhists in the world, typically found in such
countries as Ceylon, Burma, Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos, Nepal, Tibet, China,
Mongolia, Korea, Japan, and the island of Sri Lanka. In the course of history, Buddhism
was forced out of India, just as Christianity was forced out of Palestine. Siddhartha did not
wish to institute a new order in the world, as Muhammad did, but rather simply sought to
teach liberation for all people, while the world followed its own laws. Siddhartha taught
the “four noble truths”: everything is impermanent and suffering exists; suffering is based
on ignorance; suffering has an end; and there is an eightfold path that leads to Nirvana
and the end of suffering.
The eightfold path requires right views, thoughts, speech, action, livelihood, effort,
mindfulness, and concentration. He saw that all matters of life are changing and that our
attachment to the idea of an enduring self is an illusion which is the principle cause of
suffering. He taught that freedom from self liberates the heart from greed and delusion,
opening the mind to wisdom and the heart to compassion. Buddha is a term that derives
from the Sanskrit root word budh, meaning to wake up or regain consciousness.
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Siddhartha was a Bohdisattva, which is one who goes through an intense period of
development and practice in order to attain Enlightenment.
Buddhists believe that everything is subject to the laws of karma, or cause and
effect. Good thoughts, words, and actions promote good karma, while negative ones result
in bad karma. The accumulation of karma causes one to go through the cycle of death and
rebirth. Past karma conditions the present birth, and present karma, in combination with
past karma, conditions the future. The present is the offspring of the past, and becomes,
in turn, the parent of the future. Siddhartha felt that seeking happiness within the
changing world was a mistake. Many "fetters" bind people to artificial realities. Some of
these are notions of self, wrong views, doubt, desires, pride, and other addictions to “selfdeception.” He believed that acquisitions such as wealth, fame, power, sex, and even
relationships did not bring true happiness.
Buddhism believes that every being is responsible for hoh own destiny, and that the
entire system of universal effect is driven by its own internal forces. Individual beings are
what they are because of the actions they performed in the past. Siddhartha embarked on
a teaching career that lasted some forty-five years, travelling around India until he finally
died in a grove of trees at the age of eighty near the town of Vaishali. But two and a half
centuries would pass before Buddhist monks collected his teachings and recorded them in
the Tripitaka. Buddhists do not regard rebirth as a mere theory but as fact verifiable by
evidence. Documents record that this belief in rebirth was accepted by such philosopers
as Pythagoras and Plato, and by such poets as Shelley, Tennyson, and Wordsworth.
H. G. Wells considered The Buddha one of the three greatest men in history. One
who aspires to become a buddha is called a bodhisattva, which means a wisdom-being.
The bodhisattva concept is considered by many a beautiful and refined course of life that
is badly needed by a largely egocentric world. There are many different traditions of
Buddhism that are beyond the scope of this short summary, but a brief mention should be
made of Zen Buddhism, one of the oldest forms which came to Japan from China. It
teaches that people must go beyond mere words to reach and understand the true
meaning of existence. One technique for doing this is through meditation and chanting.
Five precepts that are often chanted involve a promise to harm no living beings; to not
take what is not given; to not misuse the senses; to not be false; and to not take alcohol or
drugs.
Jainism
Along with Hinduism, Buddhism, and Sikhism, Jainism
also originated in India. There are roughly seven million Jains
worldwide, with most of these in the western part of India. It
is one of the oldest living faiths which has been continuously
active in India. Current archaeological evidence traces it back
to about 1000 BCE. In its present form, Jainism originated in
eastern India and spread from there to the west. Its
philosophy was propagated by Tirthankaras, or great
teachers, who themselves were ordinary humans but, after
intensive study and experience in their own lives, had finally
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Jains with masks and brooms to
avoid harming small creatures,
credit Project Gutenberg
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attained total knowledge. Jains are followers of “Jaina,” a Sanskrit word derived from Jina,
meaning one who has conquered his or her inner passions and desires.
A fundamental belief of Jainism is that the universe consists of two types of energy,
namely Jeev and Ajeev, meaning Life and Non-Life. These have and will always exist in an
eternal universe run by its own laws. Jains believe in a creator, in the potential of
godhood, and in the divinity of the pure soul in each of us. Jainism is primarily concerned
with the evolution of the soul and its liberation from the cycle of birth and death. The
Jain path to this purity is based on the trinity of “the three jewels.” These are true
perception, true knowledge, and true conduct. To help achieve this, Jains follow the five
principles of non-violence, truth, non-stealing, non-acquisition, and chastity. Men such as
Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King were influenced by Jainism.
Jains believe that Lord Vardhamana Mahavira, the last and best of the twenty-four
Tirthankaras, was ultimately responsible for organizing his followers into four groups that
would eventually be known as the Jains. Mahavira was born in 599 BCE as a prince in
Bihar, India. At the age of 30, he left his family and royal household, gave up his worldly
possessions, and became a monk. He spent the next twelve years in deep meditation to
conquer his desires and feelings, often going without food. Jains are vegetarians and avoid
jobs that can harm other living creatures. Jain monks and nuns often sweep the paths
they are walking to remove tiny insects from harm's way. Some even wear a cloth mask
over their mouth and nose to reduce the chances for killing germs or insects that might
enter the body while breathing.
Lord Mahavira died at the age of 72, after which his purified soul presumably
achieved nirvana, becoming a Siddha or pure consciousness, living forever in a state of
total bliss. On the night of his salvation, his followers celebrated the Dipavali, or Festival
of Lights. He had spent most of his life teaching others how to overcome their inner selfish
feelings and achieve purity. As I watch most Americans carrying out their daily lives,
particularly all of the gun-toting good old boys, my respect for Jains rises higher and
higher. If there is a judging god somewhere, let that god reward the Jains for caring about
Earth’s creatures perhaps more than anyone else.
Sikhism
There are some nineteen million Sikhs worldwide, most of whom live in India, but
with smaller populations in Malaysia, East Africa, the United Kingdom, Canada, and the
United States. The Sikh religion emerged during the late
15th century in the state of Punjab in northern India.
The founder of this faith was Guru Nanak, who from
childhood was attracted to both Hindu and Muslim
teachings. Nanak was born a Hindu but, being inspired
by the teachings of Islam, began to preach the message of
unity of both religions. Sikhs don't believe in heaven or
hell, as do Christians, but do believe in good and evil.
They further believe that souls of good people will
Golden Sikh Temple in Amritsar
eventually find a haven somewhere in God's world.
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Nanak taught the unity of God, brotherhood and equality of man, rejection of caste,
and the futility of idol worship. He was followed by nine masters, the last of whom was
Guru Gobind Singh. The teachings of Guru Nanak were incorporated in the “Guru Granth
Sahib,” the Holy Book of the Sikhs which became a symbol of God for Sikhs. The original
copy of this scripture may be found at the Golden Temple in Amritsar, the spiritual center
of Sikhism. Sikhs are easy to recognize with their turbans, but also wear five other marks
for distinction. These are known as the five Ks which, in Punjabi, are Kes, Kara, Kangha,
Kachh, and Kirpan. These stand, respectively, for unshorn hair, steel bracelet, comb,
soldier's shorts, and sword. Add a turban and one has the Khalsa uniform. Each of the five
Ks has special significance in assuring cleanliness, briskness of action, self defense, and
restraint from evil or weak deeds.
Sikhs believe that bad souls will be forced to go through thousands of different life
forms before getting the chance to become human again and try for a good life. Sikhs
believe in helping the needy, becoming educated, avoiding the use of drugs or alcohol, not
eating beef, and joining the Khalsa to show that they are willing to die to uphold their
faith. They do not believe in mourning too much for one who has died. Prior to cremation,
the dead body is washed and dressed (including the five Ks, if the deceased was a member
of the Khalsa). The ashes are scattered on running water, and the family may give gifts to
people in need.
Other Religions
There are many other religions that we’ve not examined, among which are Taoism,
Confucianism, Shinto, Baha'i, Zoroastrianism, Sufism (an Islamic science for understanding
God), Scientology, Freemasonry, Jehovah's Witnesses, various Pantheisms, native tribal
beliefs, special cults, and many more. Most of these, except for the scientific ones, tend to
have variations on the themes we have discussed earlier. For this reason, I will let the
reader research these areas, but I would like to discuss the Scientific Pantheism
Organization (SPO), whose credo (only finished in December 1997) I recently came across
and liked. The SPO believes that people of today want more than just recitation of age-old
dogma and seek to find a common set of beliefs that will work well as we enter the future.
Their nine credo beliefs (not edited) are:
1.
We revere and celebrate the Universe as the ever-changing totality of being, past, present
and future. It is self-creating, self-organizing, and inexhaustibly diverse. Its overwhelming power
and fundamental mystery establish it as the only real divinity.
2.
All matter, energy, and life are an interconnected unity of which we are an inseparable part.
We rejoice in our existence and seek to participate ever more deeply in this unity through
knowledge, art, celebration, meditation, empathy, love and ethical action.
3.
We are an inseparable part of Nature, which we should cherish, revere and preserve in all its
magnificent beauty and diversity. We should strive to live in harmony with Nature locally and
globally. We believe in treating all living creatures with compassion, empathy, and respect. We
believe in the inherent value of all life, human and non-human.
4.
We believe in freedom, democracy, justice, equity, and non-discrimination, and in a world
community based on peace, an end to poverty, sustainable ways of life, and full respect for human
rights.
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5.
We believe there is only one kind of substance, matter/energy, which is not base or inferior,
but wonderfully vibrant and creative in all its forms. Body, mind, and spirit are not separate, but
all inseparably united.
6.
We respect reality and keep our minds open to the evidence of the senses and of evolving
science. These are our best means of obtaining and refining our knowledge of the Universe, and on
them we base our aesthetic and religious feelings about reality.
7.
We see death as a return to nature of our elements. Our actions, our ideas and memories of
us live on in the world, according to what we do in our lives.
8.
We believe that every individual can have direct access through perception and emotion to
ultimate reality, which is the Universe and Nature. There is no secret wisdom accessible only
through gurus or revealed scriptures.
9.
We respect the general freedom of religion, and the freedom of all pantheists to express and
celebrate their beliefs, as individuals or in groups, in any non-harmful ritual or symbolic form that
is meaningful to them.
The Fundamental Questions
Several basic questions were raised earlier that religion has been seeking to answer
for millennia. As an RS, I would love to be able to provide answers, but can do no more
than make observations about what I believe, as the existence of a supreme god (or
reincarnation) has not been scientifically proven. It must still remain a matter of faith.
Some of the great thinkers are moving towards atheism, while others see science and
religion moving closer through the finely tuned physical laws. Fortunately, there are lines
of research that may establish better circumstantial evidence in one direction or the other.
In fact, it is possible to employ Bayesian (conditional) probability theory to obtain an
estimate for the probability of a supreme god's existence, but that lengthy task would still
be dependent upon (and no better than) the input assumptions. However, I plan to run
out a "quick estimate" just out of curiosity and under the hope that one or more serious
researchers may decide to push this technique further.
What evidence from the past may be useful? What do we know about the Shroud of
Turin, the Dead Sea Scrolls, the numerous purported witnesses to the resurrection (or to
any other miracles), the discovery of Noah's Ark and the evidence for the great flood, the
Ark of the Covenant, the Holy Grail, the “missing link,” documented exorcisms, unique
prophesies that perhaps came true, the evidence for reincarnation, or the physical
workings of the universe? Answers to all of these questions are clearly interesting, but
have varying degrees of relevance in shedding light on the fundamental questions.
For example, even if the Shroud of Turin was the burial cloth for the crucified body
of Christ, that does not prove that Christ was the son of God, but only that Christ was a
real person who died around the recorded time period. As you will see later, however, the
shroud most likely covered the body of Jacques de Molay, the last Grand Master of the
Holy Order of the Knights Templar. One could even argue that the discovery of Noah's Ark
would not prove any absolute truth about God, but it would certainly (in my book) bear
upon the probability calculation. Why do I say that? Unless Noah was a weather man of
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great predictive abilities, the chances are he may have received a divine tip, should his
huge ark ever show up. I may never live to see the ark found for certain, but there have
been recent arguments for a major flood in the Black Sea region about 7,500 years ago.
Prophesies and Miracles
This area no doubt warrants an entire book, and so the reader must please forgive
my all too brief treatment. To be convincing to an RS, a prophesy must be unique, and a
miracle must have been recorded under scientific conditions. Prophesies announcing that
wars will come, walls will fall, famines and plagues will occur, great droughts and floods
will occur, anti-Christs will appear, etc., do not qualify as unique, for these types of events
will always occur, sooner or later, somewhere. A unique prophesy would predict, for
example, that 37 albino turtles will, at a specified and distant future time, form a
geometric pattern of prime-number distances (in meters) between each pair of turtles, all
facing 63 degrees east of north at the southern edge of the Caspian Sea. Now that would
be truly unique, as long as it was not “set up” by religious scholars hoping to swell the
ranks of their devoted followers.
On the miracle side, an event must violate our natural laws and be recorded by
knowledgeable observers to qualify. Depending upon exactly how the Red Sea was parted,
the cause might be natural or indeed a miracle. But we have no videotape of the event to
analyze, and a miracle of centuries past may be considered a natural event in modern
times. Surprisingly, out of some 500 books at a prominent bookstore, I only found a
handful that discussed the subjects of prophesies and miracles. Ministry publishing
sources were always for, and skeptic societies always against, the validation of these
existence-of-God-related subjects. The approach I have decided to take here is to query
Biblical scholars to determine what they believe to be the single most convincing prophesy
and single most convincing miracle, in order that we might limit our analysis. This is
certainly being fair about the matter. After all, these scholars will have had the advantage
of perusing several thousand years of history from which to make their selection and form
their arguments.
The greatest miracle is considered the resurrection of Christ, but how can we be
certain that he was really dead when taken down from the cross, wrapped, and entombed?
Some sources say the resurrection was witnessed by 500 people, while other sources cite
only a few of his closest disciples. Some religious scholars argue that Christianity would
never have had the momentum to survive and flourish had there not been a resurrection.
But it simply cannot be proved. Alternatively, feeding 5,000 people with only five loaves
of bread and two fish is impressive, but might not be literal, as Christ certainly provided
nourishment for the soul. The parting of the Red Sea is cited as another major miracle.
That, if done on command for just long enough to get one's own people across ahead of
the pursuing forces, would seem to violate the laws of physics and get my vote.
Regrettably, I have not found any data to certify such a miracle.
Not so fast, you say. The Catholic Church (CC) has a rigorous process for
canonization of saints that requires verification of at least one good miracle. The CC
recently canonized Edith Stein, a German Jew who converted to Catholicism, became a
nun, and died in a concentration camp. A little girl of two, named for Stein (but went by
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Benedicta), consumed an overdose of Tylenol, suffering irreversible liver damage and
nearly died. The parents prayed to Stein, and the little girl walked out of the hospital two
weeks later, her liver totally cured. Her American doctor talked about the miraculous
healing publicly. There is also the miracle of Guadalupe, for which an image of the Blessed
Virgin is said to have appeared on a cloak back in the 16th century. The garment has been
subjected to scientific testing which finds no brushstrokes, with some reports claiming to
have seen (through laser techniques) an image in the pupils of the virgin’s eyes of the
man to whom she is said to have appeared. But it is very difficult to verify and of these
stories, their being too far removed from current realms of examination. Did you know
there is an approved list of apparitions?
A website master for scholarly religious websites recently told me he chose the
resurrection as the top miracle and the ascension as the top prophesy, but quoted certain
scriptures as the “proof.” As you know, "self-referencing" does not constitute proof.
Typically, the supporting data for any past miracle always involves a written account of
what people believe they saw, as there were no scientific sensors available back then to
record permanent records for us to view today. Also, people then had little or no
knowledge of science, and might have believed they saw a miracle when, in fact, it was
merely a phenomenon they did not understand.
For example, the electrical power possessed by the Ark of the Covenant has recently
been explained as resulting from its construction in the form of a Leyden jar (or large
capacitor) that Moses had learned how to build from Egyptian technicians. Thus, it often
happens that "miracles" have other explanations. On the other hand, a unique prophesy
that had been recorded centuries before the event it forecast would be more convincing
than a miracle that people thought had occurred. Defenders of the Christian Bible must
also know that one great prophesy (that is truly unique) is worth a hundred purported
miracles. Thus, it makes sense to search for one great and unique prophesy that has come
to pass.
Speaking of Moses, one area I’ve not had time to investigate is the ten plagues of
Egypt which involved some pretty extreme stuff –- the bloody Nile, vast numbers of toads,
lice or midge, swarms of flies, diseased livestock, boils and ulcers, hail, teeming locusts,
intense sandstorms producing darkness, and the death of the first born. A papyrus
discovered in the 19th century describes an eyewitness account of the Exodus plagues by
an Egyptian named Ipuwer, so it is generally believed that they did actually occur. Jewish
eating restrictions spared them from the worst of these plagues. Were they miracles or
just a bad run of natural phenomena? In a special TV program devoted to this subject,
logical explanations were offered to explain how the assorted plagues occurred in the
specific sequence that played out. It was also believed that they unfolded in fairly rapid
succession, at the end of which the Pharaoh agreed to let the Israelites leave Egypt. The
reader may wish to pursue further studies here.
The 5/1/2000 issue of Newsweek Magazine contained a short section on miracles.
Several medical cases were cited, among them Bernadette McKenzie (tethered spinal
cord), Angela Boudreaux (terminal liver cancer), and Tyler Clarensau (crippled knees), all
of whom made unexplained recoveries. According to a poll, 84% of adult Americans
believe that God performs miracles, and nearly half of those claim to have personally
witnessed a miracle. Even 43% of people of no faith have prayed for God’s intervention to
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help. Of 6,000 purported miracles at the Marian shrine in Lourdes since 1858, only 66
have been “authenticated” by medical boards. In 1998 in Qom, Iran, Jamkaran mosque
officials validated 6 of 270 claims of purported miracles. Check out Kenneth Woodward’s
The Book of Miracles, published in 2000 by Simon & Schuster. Interestingly, miracles
gradually disappear as one goes through the Christian Bible from beginning to end. In
Genesis, only God works miracles. Later, the power shifts to the prophets, changing from
public to private miracles as one goes from Moses to Elijah. Finally, little or no mention is
made again. Why is this? Are the people becoming more skilled at recognizing nonmiracles?
Many religious scholars don’t believe in miracles. Philip Hefner, professor of
theology at the Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago, believes in blessings but not in
miracles. He is troubled by the notion that God might intervene in the laws of nature,
leading to chaos and unpredictability. But others say that nature provides enough “wiggle
room” for God to tweak events one way or the other. Actually, these arguments are weak.
If God does exist, he/she/it can do whatever he/she/it wants. But if God is the type of
moral being that he/she/it wants his/her/its followers to be, then he/she/it does not act
consistently in rewarding the deserving and punishing the unworthy. Since I have
personally never witnessed a miracle that fell outside the statistics of random events or
psychosomatic influences, I’d like to move on to the prophesy section. What we really
need is a miracle that can be repeated under scientific conditions. When that happens, it
will be major news!
A Unique Prophesy
A prophesy is usually a vision that comes to a prophet from a higher power and
that, when properly interpreted, foretells of some future event. The prophet community
includes seers, oracles, soothsayers, and diviners, all of whom predict the future by means
of instruments, dreams, telepathy, clairvoyance, or special visions, many purportedly
received from divine beings. The emergence of prophesy in Israel and Judah began with
Amos and Hosea in the 8th century BCE, with Elijah known as one of the prophet masters.
Some predictions, no doubt, simply derived from common sense and intelligent
observation, but our focus will be directed at finding one great and unique prophesy that
was transmitted from the God of the Christian Bible through one of his prophets.
One particularly famous prophesy is the one in Revelation predicting the end of the
world in a huge battle between Gog and Magog. Religious scholars believe this final
conflict will take place in the Middle East around the time of the second millennium
following the resurrection of Christ, making this about 2033 CE. Though these same
scholars believe the tremendous fire to be that associated with a nuclear war, others
acknowledge the blast could come from an asteroid or cometary impact. So you will find it
interesting that JPL announced in November of 2000 the orbital path of an object dubbed
2000 SG344, which will make a close pass by Earth in 2030 and again in 2071. The object
is roughly 100-230 feet long and may be either a small asteroid or a large rocket booster
stage left over from the Apollo era. The press is making a fairly big deal of it, but I
calculate the odds of an impact at about 1 chance in 100,000. I’ll not likely live to the age
of 98 to be around in 2033, but some of my readers are sure to -– but don’t worry about
this prophesy. Its odds are quite low. I am no fan of former president George W. Bush and
find the following quote from Wikipedia quite revealing:
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“The French ex-President Jacques René Chirac recounted during an interview with the French journalist
Jean-Claude Maurice how the U.S. President George Walker Bush asked him in 2003 during a phone
conversation for support of the invasion of Iraq. In Maurice's book Si vous le répétez, je démentirai George
W. Bush is documented to have said ‘Gog and Magog are at work in the Middle East’, ‘The biblical
prophecies are being fulfilled’, and ‘This confrontation is willed by God, who wants to use this conflict to
erase his people’s enemies before a New Age begins.’ The first American newspaper to report this story
was the Charlestown West Virginia Gazette.”
The biblical book of Daniel presents a collection of popular stories about Daniel, a
prophet and loyal Jew, and the visions granted to him, with the Babylonian Exile of the
6th century BCE as their background. The book is written in two languages, with some of
the 12 chapters in Hebrew and the rest in Aramaic. Chapters 1-6 are stories of Daniel and
his friends in exile, with Chapters 7-12 mostly about his apocalyptic visions (from the
Greek “apokalypsis”, meaning revelations). Because of the conflict between the religion of
the Jews and the paganism of their foreign rulers, Daniel sought to reveal the superiority
of Hebrew wisdom over paganism, believing that the God of Israel would ultimately defeat
all Earthly kings and rescue his followers from their persecutors. Many recall the story of
Daniel tossed into a den of lions when he refused to worship King Nebuchadnezzar's
golden idol, with his strong faith protecting him.
Many of Daniel's prophecies include time spans which must be understood as
symbolic. These have to be translated into real time using the year-for-a-day principle,
with most visions taking the form of compex and bizarre symbolic events. At times, Daniel
received help from the angel Gabriel in explaining a particular vision. With lengthy
analysis and highly inventive decoding, some religious scholars claim to have interpreted
Daniel’s assorted visions, though religious organizations often disagree with certain
meanings. Daniel’s visions were wide ranging, covering such matters as the fall of Rome,
rise of the Catholic church, Alexander the Great and his conquests, the reunification of
Jerusalem, the second coming of Christ, the crusades, and other matters concerned with
the Jewish struggles.
If I had to choose one prophesy that qualifies as unique and that has the support of
many religious scholars, it would have to be the prediction of the six-day war in the Sinai
between Israel and the Arab confederacy in June of 1967. Religious scholars claim that
Daniel accurately made and documented this forecast some 23 centuries before it took
place. If that could be substantiated, it could well indicate a pipeline from God through
Gabriel to Daniel. Part of me wanted to include here the full extent of the vision in
Chapter 8 of the book of Daniel, as well as the interpretation of this in predicting the sixday war -- but it would simply be too long. If you have a bible and can read about the
“ram” and the “he-goat,” you can check it out. If you are not that interested and would be
curious to see three short, separated samples, consider:
“Then I lifted up mine eyes, and saw, and, behold, there stood before the river a ram which
had two horns: and the two horns were high; but one was higher than the other, and the higher
came up last. I saw the ram pushing westward, and northward, and southward; so that no beasts
might stand before him, neither was there any that could deliver out of his hand; but he did
according to his will, and became great.”
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“And he said unto me, unto two thousand and three hundred days; then shall the sanctuary
be cleansed. And it came to pass, when I, even I Daniel, had seen the vision, and sought for the
meaning, then, behold, there stood before me as the appearance of a man. And I heard a man's
voice between the banks of Ulai, which called, and said, Gabriel, make this man to understand the
vision.”
“And he said, Behold, I will make thee know what shall be in the last end of the indignation:
for at the time appointed the end shall be. The ram which thou sawest having two horns are the
kings of Media and Persia. And the rough goat is the king of Grecia: and the great horn that is
between his eyes is the first king.”
So you get the idea. Well, reader, I have tried to dig the six-day war in June of 1967
out of this prophesy, but it takes some highly inventive interpretation of the words. To the
same extent that the face on Mars appears in one geological formation, it is possible to
squeeze a variety of interpretations from Daniel’s symbolic words. The more obvious
interpretations simply relate to the struggles during Daniel’s time period between the Jews
and their enemies. So how did scholars deduce the six-day war, and what was so
important about that war? A report by a Jewish newsperson summarized the final war
moments as:
“For two bitter days, the desperate Jews and Hussein’s well-trained Arabs battled to take and
hold the high ground around Mount Scopus and between Jerusalem and Ramallah, all outside the
Old City’s massive ten-foot-thick walls. Then, at 9:50 a.m., on June 7, a Wednesday, after the Jews
had gained the upper hand, Colonel Morechai Gur and his chauffeur, Ben Tsur, rammed their
vehicle into and through St. Stephen’s Gate to lead the Israelis’ takeover of the Old City and their
Temple site, just as Daniel had predicted.”
The full interpretive logic is too long for inclusion here, but I want you to note how
the year 1967 was concluded, weighing the following words by a religious scholar:
“These 2300 days or years are to be counted from the beginning of the vision, when the hegoat rushed at the ram, or from 334 BCE. Thus, subtracting 334 from 2300 yields 1966. This
arithmetic brings the vision one year short of the recapture of old Jerusalem and the Temple site
in 1967. However, when Dionysius Exiguus, a Scythian monk, set up the chronology for the
Christian Era in the sixth century he neglected to include a 0 year between 1 BCE and CE 1. Thus,
where the year 1 BCE concluded, the year CE 1 began. This error of Exiguus therefore makes it
necessary to add one year whenever chronological years are being calculated from any year in BCE
to any year in CE. With this correction, we now have the following figures: 334 BCE subtracted from
2300 years yields 1966 CE, and 1 year added to make up for Exiguus’ mistake equals 1967 CE.” Not
too bad, however.
So you get a flavor for what is involved, but this is typical of most prophetic
interpretations. The scholar in question gets to choose both the beginning epoch for the
prophetic time period (which itself must be interpreted from the prophesy) and the
actual event that has played out centuries later (and there are plenty of those to choose
from, with the eternal struggle between the Jews and the Arabs leading to noteworthy
conflicts on at least a yearly basis). Thus, it is not difficult to invent connections to defend
prophesies. Hence, as an RS, I remain generally unconvinced. However, when we
eventually discuss the probability of God’s existence, I am willing to give the category of
unique prophesies a small probability (perhaps 5%) of being valid.
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Noah's Ark
The issue of whether or not a great ark has been discovered that could have
harbored fecund pairs of "all creatures" is absolutely fascinating and would definitely
bear (in my opinion) upon the existence of the God referred to in the Christian Bible. But
my limited research into this matter has produced about as much testimony for as against.
As the reader may recall, God instructed Noah to build a great ark and place aboard it an
adult male and female of every "unclean beast" and seven (presumably pairs) of every
"clean beast" (mostly ruminants) and bird types. He further gave Noah seven days to load
the ark before a continuous rain of forty days and nights would destroy “every living
substance from the face of the earth,” not otherwise spared by being aboard the ark.
The only humans aboard the ark were Noah, his wife, and his three sons and their
wives. The resulting flood did not subside for 150 days. The Bible claims that Noah did
not die until he was 950 years old, with modern-day explanations for such longevity (not
uncommon among ancient Biblical patriarchs) due to a
special chemical from a plant that one might have thought
was eradicated by the flood, even though the birds were to
have been the “seed carriers,” and Noah lived for 350
years after the flood.
The dimensions of the ark were 300 cubits long by
50 cubits wide by 30 cubits high, and it was to be
constructed of gopher wood. Under the assumption that a
Ark replica by Johan Huiber,
Hebrew "cubit" was roughly 18 inches (as opposed to about
credit Freekick Files
20.6 inches for the Egyptian cubit), the ark length would
have been about 450 feet. The first question that occurs to any RS concerns the feasibility
of providing for the needs of so many creatures in a volume of this size. One also must
wonder about collecting them all from other parts of the world, unless they were to be
only samples from Noah's immediate land mass. How were they cared for by a human
crew of only eight people? What other problems needed solutions? The reader may find an
extensive analysis of this in John Woodmorappe's book Noah's Ark: A Feasibility Study,
which concludes that it was feasible. But then there are counter analyses by Glenn Morton
and Mark Isaak, who contend otherwise.
Was there a great flood and when did it occur? There seem to be several reports of
the flood, but its purported time period ranges from about 10,000 to 2,500 BCE, with a
slight preference for the period from 5,000 to 3,000 BCE (Adam and Eve were said to have
lived about 2,000 years prior to the flood). Usually, the perspective on the flood varies
markedly with the origin of the storyteller, ranging from ancient Babylonians to Tlingit
Indians, but two fascinating discoveries by Robert Ballard of Titanic-discovery fame may
provide the best evidence yet for the great flood. In November of 1999, Ballard’s team
found a submerged shoreline several miles offshore from the current edge of the Black Sea
and several hundred feet below the surface. Later, in September of 2000, they found the
remains of a 7,500-year-old house more than 300 feet below the surface of the Black Sea.
Marine geologist William F. Ryan of Columbia University said, “This is amazing. It’s going
to rewrite the history of ancient civilizations because it shows unequivocally that the Black
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Sea flood took place and that the ancient shores of the Black Sea were occupied by
humans.”
Those who claim to know the location of Noah’s Ark are pretty consistent in citing
the Ahora Gorge region, between 13,000 and 15,000 feet in elevation, on the
northwestern side of Mount Ararat in eastern Turkey, but Mount Cudi and the Durupinar
areas are also candidates by several researchers. The earliest report of its resting place is
attributed to Marco Polo some seven centuries ago. More recent reports began in 1905
when George Hagopian, as a young boy, claimed to have walked the planks and examined
the ark for two hours with his uncle. Then came Lt. Roskovitsky of the Russian Imperial
Air Force in 1916 whose discovery caused the Tsar to send two engineering companies to
collect detailed information, only to have it "lost" following the Revolution of 1917 (some
believe this entire story is a fabrication). We next have Lt. Col. Robert Livingston's account
of seeing a real photo taken by a USAF captain in 1949, but not seen since (it did show a
large object of the proper 6:1 length-to-width ratio). There were many other names to
follow these over the next half century, but any surviving evidence is elusive.
We next turn to Mr. Matthew Kneisler of the newly formed (February 1998) Ark
Research Ministries (ARM) organization. Having heard that classified photos of the ark
existed somewhere, he wrote in 1997 to thirteen special agencies to shake something loose
under FOIA. A portion of his letter reads, "I request that a copy of any records
(photographs, typed document and/or verbal description) be provided to me regarding
‘The Noah's Ark’ anomaly located at about 13,000 feet on Mount Ararat in Turkey. The
item in question is box-shaped, 450 by 75 feet, and can be observed in the late summer
(August/September) when the glaciers at approximately 13,000 feet have melted
sufficiently to reveal the object. I have heard that, in 1974, Earth Research Technical
Satellite (ERTS) has captured this image on film. I know that technology has increased
dramatically allowing for more detailed resolution from space satellites and that this
image has been seen subsequently. More specifically, I am requesting a latitude and
longitude at which the anomaly is located."
Included among those thirteen agencies were
the CIA, NASA, NOAA, NSC, DIA, NARA, DMA, NRO,
State Dept, and the White House. Only the CIA and
the DIA (Defense Intelligence Agency) replied in a
positive manner, but the CIA refused to release its
information on the basis of national security (don’t
you tire of this excuse?) and foreign policy
Suggested ark location in Ahora Gorge
restrictions. The DIA, however, did provide copies of
on Mt. Ararat, credit N/A
two photographs taken by the USAF on June 17,
1949, which were finally declassified in 1982. The location of the "anomaly" was 39 deg
42.17 min N by 44 deg 16.50 min E, at an elevation of about 15,000 feet, some 2.2 km
west of the Ararat summit. Kneisler learned that these aerial photos had been released
earlier (March 14, 1995) to a Mr. Porcher Taylor, who believed them to actually show
compartments in a large broken structure. The photographs were subsequently moved
from DIA to NARA. Since this "break" in the Ark-info logjam, the CIA and the State Dept
have both offered to provide more info to Kneisler.
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The ARM team had planned an expedition to Mount Ararat in August of 1999, but
ultimately had to postpone it. Many researchers doubt the existence of any convincing
photos or satellite imagery, believing Matthew Keinsler to be exaggerating what evidence
may exist. Ararat is an inhospitable mountain bordering Armenia and Iran, with a
permanent ice cap and glaciers, making the weather a significant factor. But I laud their
efforts, and will report their results if available before this book is published. The
confirmed discovery of Noah's Ark would, in my mind, be more dramatic than the
discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls or even Christ's purported burial cloth. For Noah would
have had no way to anticipate a great flood without a divine tip. If he got such a tip, it
would not be unreasonable to assume it came from the God referred to in the Christian
Bible. The Ballard team’s discovery of a great flood of 7,500 years ago or earlier should do
much to keep alive the search for the remains of Noah’s Ark.
The Shroud of Turin
The Shroud of Turin is a 14-by-3-foot linen cloth that shows the photographically
negative image of a bearded man with nail wounds in his wrists and feet, a gash in his
side, and assorted lesser markings. It surfaced in 1357 CE in the
small village of Lirey, France. The shroud had been loaned to the
local church by the widow of Geoffrey de Charney, a minor
nobleman who had died a few months earlier. No explanation was
then given for how the Charney family came by the shroud.
Ultimately, the family sold the shroud to Duke Louis of Savoy in
return for two castles. The Savoy family subsequently provided all
of the kings of Italy and maintained control of the shroud since
1453. The shroud has been in the Chapel of the Holy Shroud, in the
Cathedral of St John the Baptist in Turin, for more than the past
300 years.
Portion of Turin shroud,
credit Dating Jesus Org.
In 1898, an amateur photographer by the name of Secondo
Pia was allowed to take some photos of the shroud. He was totally surprised when he
looked at the negative plates and saw the striking image of a bearded man as it would
normally appear, i.e., with raised areas of the face and body in brighter tones, and
recessed or sunken regions, such as eye sockets, in darker tones. Such a discovery quickly
enhanced the mystery and spiritual fascination in the shroud, causing many more people
to believe it to be the burial cloth of Jesus Christ.
In 1988, samples of the cloth were radiocarbon dated by three independent
laboratories (in Oxford, Zurich, and Arizona). These laboratories were also given other
samples from known time periods, and their results were overseen and certified by the
British Museum, an organization of high integrity. The dating process based upon the
decay of carbon 14 was well established, and the results were in close agreement,
indicating the cloth was woven between 1260 and 1390 CE, much too late for association
with Christ. It was believed by many to be the work of a skilled forger. It was also noted
that the cloth itself was a relatively sophisticated herringbone pattern with a 3:1 twill
weave that did not appear in Europe until the beginning of the 14th century.
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However, a program appearing on The Learning Channel in December of 1998
offered strong evidence for the shroud being the Christ burial cloth through many
correlations of different shroud plant markings and pollens unique to the Jerusalem
region around the correct time period. Also, the correct imprints of Roman lashing whips
were identified. Further, in 1998, researchers at the University of Texas in San Antonio
reported that the 1988 dating had been inaccurate due to the presence of bacterial and
fungal contaminents mixed in with the cellulose of the cloth fibers, and that the true age
was many centuries older. Further, some claimed that the shroud sample tested was
actually from a portion of the shroud that had been repaired during Medieval times.
As I was browsing books at a local store in early 1999, I came across a most unusual
new explanation for the shroud in a book entitled The Second Messiah by Christopher
Knight and Robert Lomas (Element Books). Through a great deal of research on the history
of the Knights Templar and the Freemasons, they believe that the shroud was wrapped
around the body of a man who went through a sort of mock crucifixion. That man was
Jacques de Molay, the last Grand Master of the Holy Order of the Knights Templar, who
eventually died on March 19, 1314, nearly seven years after his tortured crucifixion to
extract a confession. The explanation for the remarkable image on the shroud was
provided by Dr. Alan Mills, who works in the Dept of Physics and Astronomy at the
University of Leicester, but is beyond the scope of this summary.
The Second Messiah is one of the most interesting historical books I have read, an
admission you would not expect to hear from an RS. The depth of the authors' research is
astounding and the conclusions amazing and believable … placed in question only by the
later claim that the radio carbon dating used a Medieval repair patch and not the original
shroud. Their epic story begins in the time of Christ (whom they believe died on the cross,
but did not rise from the dead), including the slaughter of the Jewish nation in 70 CE, and
traces the true beliefs of Christianity over the following centuries from the Knights
Templar through the Freemasons until the present. They point out many interesting
similarities between the circumstances surrounding the crucifixions of Jesus Christ and
Jacques de Molay. They also paint a treacherous pattern of behavior by the Catholic
Church which further reduces my opinion of that powerful body. Their book is a must
read for anyone wishing to learn more about the journey of Christianity.
Thus, the debate continues, with millions still believing the shroud to be the robe
that was wrapped around the body of Jesus, others believing the whole matter to be an
unusual forgery, and yet others convinced that the man inside the cloth was Jacques de
Molay, a slender man whose features were believed to be similar to those of Jesus Christ.
After weighing all that I have read, it is my own conviction that the shroud likely covered
de Molay, not Christ. As radio commentator Paul Harvey might have said in the way of an
ending "gotcha" remark, the Templar who was roasted alongside of de Molay in 1314 was
a man by the name of Geoffrey de Charney, Preceptor of Normandy and ancestor of the
family who first presented the shroud to the church in Lirey in 1357.
The Dead Sea Scrolls
The Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered in eleven caves along the northwest shore of
the Dead Sea between 1947 and 1956. The area is 13 miles east of Jerusalem and 1300
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feet below sea level. Of the 850-or-so manuscripts discovered, Cave 4 produced the largest
single find in 1950 of about 15,000 fragments from more than 500 manuscripts. After
archaeologists excavated the nearby Qumran ruins, subsequent radiocarbon dating
indicated both the ruins and the scrolls dated from about 250 BCE to 68 CE, making them
a thousand years older than any other surviving Biblical manuscripts!
The Scrolls were mostly written in Hebrew, but with many written in Aramaic (the
language of the Palestinian Jews around the time of Christ), and even a few in Greek. The
scrolls were typically made of animal skins, but also of papyrus and one scroll of copper.
They were written with a carbon-based ink, from right to left, using no punctuation except
for an occasional paragraph indentation. The Scrolls appear to have been hidden away in
these eleven caves around the outbreak of the First Jewish Revolt (66-70 CE) as the Roman
army advanced against the rebel Jews.
The scrolls contain the complete Hebrew canon (the Old Testament) except for the
book of Esther. There are prophesies by Ezekiel, Jeremiah, and David not contained in
today's Bible, as well as previously unknown stories about Noah
and Abraham, including an explanation for why God asked
Abraham to sacrifice his son Issac (ultimately, a ram instead).
Even the last words of Amram, the father of Moses, are recorded
in the Scrolls. The copper scroll, from Cave 3, identifies 64
underground hiding places for treasures from the Temple at
Jerusalem.
For some unexplained reason, none of the scrolls refers to
Jesus Christ or his followers, though there is mention of a messiah
who will be “pierced.” Of greatest relevance, the scrolls do show
Small Sample of Dead
Christianity to be rooted in Judaism and have been called the
Sea Scrolls Writing
evolutionary link between the two. They do lend further credence
to the religious stories that are the basis for such enduring faith over the four millennia
that have passed since the days of Abraham, whose death was cited at the age of 175
years, even though the present theoretical age span for humans is about 120 years.
Before leaving the subject of the Dead Sea, it has been verified that a sizable
earthquake occurred in that area around the time of Abraham in 1900 BCE. This quake is
believed responsible for the destruction of the evil “cities of the plain,” including Sodom
and Gomorrah, which probably lie buried under the southern end of the Red Sea. The
Bible states that God destroyed these cities with “fire and brimstone,” but could their
destruction have simply been a natural disaster? Or did God trigger an earthquake that
further aggravated some volcano to supply the fire? We just don't know.
In Israel Knohl’s book The Messiah Before Jesus: The Suffering Servant of the Dead
Sea Scrolls, the author has discovered a reference in one fragment of the scrolls that
provides the earliest time that the dual concepts of divine guidance and suffering for
others were combined into a messianic precedent. Although many religious scholars
believe that the writer was referring only to an imaginary messiah, Knohl is convinced
that the reference is to a real man named Menahem, who was the leader of the Jewish sect
in Qumran. Menahem was eventually killed by Roman soldiers, but not before (Knohl
believes) he had established his beliefs as a role model for Christ to follow. Many scholars
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believe that John the Baptist was a member of the Qumran sect before he began to follow
Christ. All scholars agree that the scrolls bring the views of Judaism and Christianity much
closer together, explaining how the latter branched from the former.
Ark of the Covenant
In 1981, the popular movie Raiders of the Lost Ark was based upon a race (between
an archaeologist and some of Hitler’s people) to find the Biblical Ark of the Covenant,
which had presumably been built around the 13th to 14th century BCE during the time of
Moses’ wilderness journeys. There are over 200 references in the Old Testament to this
holy chest (aron in Hebrew). According to the scriptures, God commanded Moses to build
the Ark to house the stone tablets containing the ten commandments. The Ark was
actually made in Sinai by a man named Bezaleel ben Uri, who used shittim wood covered
in gold leaf, with two cherubs on the top of the rectangular chest. Its size was believed to
have been about 45 inches long by 28 inches high and wide. It contained two rings
mounted on strong staves along each side of its length, so that poles could be inserted for
transport by one or two persons at each end of the Ark. As you may recall, Moses led the
children of Israel out of Egypt to Canaan, the “promised
land,” now known as Palestine. After a long journey from
Sinai, the Ark was eventually placed in the Holy of Holies
chamber in Solomon’s Temple during the 10th century BCE.
The Ark was a portable place of worship used by the
Israelites who were often on the move. God’s presence was
claimed to have been located above the chest and between
the two cherubs. From that point, He could administer
advice and justice, vitally important to the attending
Hebrews. The scriptures refer to fire emanating from the Ark
to burn up “snakes, scorpions, thorns, and Israel’s enemies.”
Ark of the Covenant Possible
If so, modern-day analysis has ascribed this to the Ark’s
Design, credit N/A
construction in the form of a Leyden jar that can store and
discharge electricity -– a process that Moses would have learned from Egyptian
technicians. Where is the Ark today? Answers range widely from buried in the rubble of
Solomon’s first temple when it was destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 BCE to Axum,
Ethiopia, in the hands of the black Jewish Falashas. Many suspect the Babylonians found
and removed its gold and left the wood to decay. Those who believe it is not under
Solomon’s first temple are certain that Jeremiah hid it in a cave on Mount Nebo (on the
Jordan River’s east bank) before the Babylonian invasion. Over the centuries, its search
has even been connected to the Crusaders and the Freemasons.
Some say it is hidden on Jordan’s west bank near the Dead Sea, associated somehow
with the Qumran site and the people of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Some say it is under
Jerusalem in a stone-carved tunnel. Some say it is under the site of the crucifixion; others
say it is under the Temple Mount. In the 1981 movie mentioned above, it was taken by
Egyptian Pharaoh Shishak, who placed it near the mouth of the Nile, in lower Egypt. The
late Biblical archaeologist Ron Wyatt claims to have discovered the Ark on January 6,
1982. He had been inspired earlier to search near the Calvary Escarpment when passing
through that area in Jerusalem in 1978. Wyatt and his two sons later got permission to dig
in this area he felt so strongly about. They dug pretty much straight down, at the base of a
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cliff face known as Golgotha, near the site of the crucifixion. There Wyatt believes that he
found the tomb of Christ and the Ark, whose top surface was covered by dried blood,
presumably that of Christ, which had dripped onto the Ark from his short-term resting
place. Wyatt claimed to have photographed the Ark with a Polaroid camera, but the
images had turned out “foggy.” As there is no scientific proof of Wyatt’s story, we must let
the matter lie at this point.
Exorcism
Now here is an interesting subject. If one could prove that Satan (or his evil
presence) had been driven out of the bodies of several living people, then that could
suggest that God must also exist. But how would we ever do that, given all of the technical
explanations that exist in the field of psychiatry for the wide range of human behaviors?
By the time people have lived for several years, depending upon how they have been
treated by others, a number of neuroses may have developed, including schizophrenia
and other mental disorders. So, if we are to find any useful evidence here, I would assume
that it must be with exorcisms performed (and scientifically recorded) on very young
people who have not lived long enough to have experienced otherwise explainable mental
disorders.
Suppose, for the sake of argument, that we were unable to find any suitable “young
exorcisees,” that would still not end the matter. For witnesses at several exorcisms have
reported the supernatural behavior of other happenings such as objects levitating or
flying across the room, and exorcisees blurting out detailed personal knowledge of the
exorcist and other clerics that could not possibly have been known in advance. As an RS, I
find these accounts difficult to believe without having been present, or in the absence of
legitimate movie or video footage acquired by an objective person. If I were an exorcist
who passionately believed the whole demonic-possession phenomenon, I might well
believe that I had seen moving objects during the course of the exorcism. There simply
needs to be scientific proof under controlled conditions. I would think that the exorcists
themselves would also want that, for it would strengthen their arguments for the existence
of God.
In searching about for young exorcisees, I have only come across the story of a 13year-old Lutheran boy who was not nearly young enough to qualify from my point of
view. However, it did form the basis for the 2000 movie Possessed, and so you may find its
capsule summary interesting. It is based upon a book by Thomas Allen and involves the
eventual exorcism of Robbie Mannheim’s evil spirit following his becoming "possessed"
after playing with a Ouija board. The story begins in 1949 in Mount Rainier, Maryland,
then moves on to Saint Louis.
The exorcist and other witness priests recorded such behaviors as copious excreting,
precision spitting with eyes closed, a 50-lb dresser that moved across the floor, a vibrating
bed, suddenly appearing bloody marks on the body, and a professional singing voice.
Father William Bowdern lost 40 lbs over an extended period in performing the exorcism,
but was eventually successful. Nonetheless, I must question why no one thought to film
these remarkable events. Simple 8mm movies cameras were available in 1949.
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An interesting article appeared in the Paris Journal of June 1998, written by Marlise
Simons and dealing with the Rev. Claude Nicolas, a leading exorcist of Notre Dame who
had been performing this service several times each week for the past decade. Rev. Nicolas
is one of nearly a hundred exorcists (five times the number of 20 years ago) appointed by
the Catholic Church in France. Though people often come to him believing they are
possessed, he told Marlise Simons, "Of course, the evil spirit often disguises a serious
mental problem.”
Rev. Nicolas also admits to having seen patients bleed suddenly and for no obvious
reason. When the Catholic Church updated many of its religious rites in the 1960s, it
dropped the 400-year-old one on exorcism. But in 1995, a poll showed that 34% of the
French people believed in the Devil's existence. Thus, the Vatican appears caught in a
bind, on the one hand acknowledging the Devil's presence and, on the other hand,
recognizing that demonic possession may be entirely explainable in other ways.
Reincarnation
You may wonder why an RS decides to even briefly explore this subject. Certainly,
reincarnation is an interesting notion, but it is difficult to accept on a scientific basis. It
does, however, help to explain the crippling of a very young child who has not sinned (i.e.,
that child's soul is being punished for evil deeds done in a prior life). It is a more
convincing and logical explanation than either of the two most commons answers given by
religious folks. First, they will declare that “God moves in mysterious ways,” when trying to
explain some terrible injustice, particularly at the hands of a god who purports to love little
children. Secondly, they may declare that God has chosen that way to bring the family
together, in rallying around the crisis of the child. But the Christian God certainly has the
power to find other ways to unite the family, or achieve whatever ultimate cause was
intended by crippling the child. This is a matter that my great grandfather Pa Thompson
has much to say on later.
There is an interesting mathematical issue relative to reincarnation that we noted
earlier under the subsection on Hinduism. As there are more new human bodies being born
than there are departed souls to occupy them, then a given soul must move on after death
to inhabit more than one newly born human. Alternatively, some brand new souls may be
created for each of the excess bodies. There are no rules against this, but it is interesting to
contemplate. I wonder if the creators of the reincarnation concept were originally aware of
the numerical issues. Here’s an unusual thought. What if one soul inhabits the body of each
living creature and, as the human population swells, the non-human population falls by a
corresponding amount? Then we could just move souls about without having to create new
ones.
With many Asian religions originating in India believing in reincarnation, the matter
is important to explore. The process of discovering the rebirth of a reincarnated lama can
be elaborate and exacting, particularly in the selection of a Dalai Lama, which has many
political implications. The rebirth may take place at any time, from days to years, following
the death of the previous lama. The state oracle at Nechung is consulted for the
whereabouts of the newly born Dalai Lama. Remarks made by the Dalai Lama before his
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death are frequently accepted as indications of a favored place for rebirth, as are any
unusual signs that are observed during his death or during a birth thereafter.
Most claims of reincarnated souls can be discounted, but there are a few that have
challenged simple explanations. One such case took place in Lebanon in 1959. Young Imad
Elawar’s first spoken word was “Jamile.” As he grew older he spoke of events that took place
in a village 30 km from where he lived. He claimed he was a member of the Bouzhamy
family and often talked about Jamile whom he said was a beautiful woman. He described an
accident in which a man’s legs were crushed under a truck. Claiming that man had been
him, he was delighted that he could now walk. Professor Ian Stevenson investigated this
case when Imad was five years old. Stevenson collected as many facts as possible from Imad
and went to the village that Imad named.
There he found a family named Bouzhami whose member, Said Bouzhami, had been
hit by a truck. Said had a cousin named Ibrahim, who was the black sheep of the village.
Ibrahim and Jamile, his mistress, lived together despite the disapproval of the other
villagers. Ibrahim died of tuberculosis at the young age of twenty-seven. In his final six
months he was unable to walk and confined to his bed. Stevenson then brought Imad to the
village. Imad gave exact names and directions to the village to the driver. Imad described
the furniture in the Ibrahim’s house exactly as it appeared when they arrived. Imad
discovered the hiding place of a gun that Ibrahim had concealed and that no one else had
been able to locate.
Another interesting case of reincarnation was that of Joan Grant. While she was a
child in England in the early 1900s, she used to say that she was the former daughter of an
Egyption Pharaoh. These stories embarrassed her family so she suppressed most of those
memories. As an adult, she took a trip to Egypt and the memories of her past lives
resurfaced. In 1937, with her husband’s encouragement, she wrote a book called Winged
Pharaoh about the life of Sekeeta, the daughter of a Pharaoh who lived 3,000 years ago. She
claims to have done no research before writing the book and she had little knowledge of
Egypt’s ancient history. Her book was reviewed by many Egyptologists and critics who all
said it was historically accurate, although many doubted the claim that she did no research
whatsoever before the publication.
One of the most famous of all reincarnation cases was the Bridey Murphy case. In
1952, Morey Bernstein hypnotized Virginia Tighe, who began speaking in an Irish brogue
and claimed to be Bridey Murphy, a 19th century woman from Cork, Ireland. While under
hypnosis, she sang Irish songs and told Irish stories, always as Bridey Murphy. Bernstein's
book, The Search for Bridey Murphy, became a best-seller. Recordings of the hypnotic
sessions were made and translated into more than a dozen languages, soon spreading a
major interest in reincarnation.
Reporters traveled to Ireland to determine whether a red-headed Bridey Murphy once
lived there in the nineteenth century. Ironically, the Chicago American newspaper found a
Bridie Murphey Corkell living in the house across the street from where Virginia Tighe grew
up in Chicago. What Virginia reported under hypnosis were not memories of a previous life
but memories from her early childhood. Many people were impressed with the details of
Tighe's hypnotic memories, but the details were not evidence of a past life. They were
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simply evidence of a vivid imagination, a confused memory, fraud, or a combination of all
three.
As Martin Gardner says, "Almost any hypnotic subject capable of going into a deep
trance will babble about a previous incarnation if the hypnotist asks him to. He will babble
just as freely about his future incarnations. In every case of this sort where there has been
adequate checking on the subject's past, it has been found that the subject was weaving
together long forgotten bits of information acquired during his early years."
Evolution vs Creation
The debate over the origins of Earth, its life forms, and the rest of the universe is
between evolution (either with or without the help of God) and creation science. In a 1997
Gallop poll, 44% of the U.S. public believed that God created the universe during six
consecutive twenty-four hour days less than 10,000 years ago, just as stated in the biblical
chapter of Genesis. That same poll showed 39% to believe that humans evolved from lower
life forms over a much longer period, but still under the direction of God. Only 10%
believed in natural forces driving evolution with no help from God.
The percentage of scientists who support evolution theory is close to 95%. Scientists
have been able to observe the evolution of fruit flies and certain species of fish in the
laboratory, but there is no physical evidence to prove or disprove whether the hand of God
or natural processes guides the work. It is possible to find physical evidence of the age of
Earth and evolution processes through different scientific evaluations (biology, geology,
astronomy, paleontology, and physics). These observations of evolution include:
astronomical observations of galaxies that appear to be in different stages of development,
fossil records of plants recording evolution over time, plate tectonics, and other geological
processes that appear to have occurred over very long periods of time.
Perhaps the greatest difficulty facing those who hold to creationism is how to explain
a rock dated as billions of years old by the use of radioisotope analysis, if the world was
created less than ten thousand years ago. Creation scientists conclude that the scientific
dating methods must be in error by a factor of perhaps a million, but we truly know that
radioisotope dating is very reliable and accurate. Even if the creationists argue that only
man was created a few thousand years ago, with Earth having been in place for a few
billion years, then how do they explain the discovery of early human bones from nearly
two million years ago?
Creationists also argue that no transitional links have been found in either the fossil
record or the modern world, and that natural selection is incapable of advancing an
organism to a higher order. They also argue that life cannot result from non-life, and that
the supposed creatures in between ape and man often consist of discoveries which are
unrevealing and inconsistent. All of the supposed in-betweeners can be explained as being
either fully monkey-ape or fully modern human, but not as something transitional. Yet the
DNA difference between lower ape and modern man is only 1-5%, much of which is “junk
DNA.” Creationists also contend that the rock strata fossil finds are better explained by a
universal flood than by evolution.
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The debate between evolution and creation science continues in the U.S. public
schools. After the Scopes Trial (Tennessee, 1925) the theory of evolution gained much
public support. However, it was not until the early 1960s that evolution began to be taught
widely in public schools. During the mid 1990s, creation science groups started to
persuade school boards to give equal time to creation science. In August of 1999, Vicepresident Al Gore's office announced that he favored the teaching of evolution in public
school science classes, but would not oppose instruction in creationism if taught as part of
a religious course. A White House spokesperson said that President Clinton accepted the
ruling of the U.S. Supreme Court in 1987 that public schools were not free to teach
creationism (or, later, extrapolated to intelligent design).
The Knowledge Book
One day as I was working on the Cassini mission to Saturn, a huge book arrived in
the mail for me. It was handsomely printed with golden edges, entitled The Knowledge
Book (TKB), contained 1,111 pages, was published in February 1996, and claimed to have
unified all that mattered in religion into a single great book. Its contents were transmitted
over the "direct alpha channel" from the Lord to one Vedia Bulent (Onsu) Corak, a special
person chosen to "pen" the supreme message. The followers of these voluminous
teachings seem to be centered in Istanbul, Turkey. The teachings are transmitted by a
single supreme Lord, extend the existing Qur'an, yet also allow for reincarnation, implying
(I assume) some sort of unification of Abrahamic and Vedic cultures. Portions of the book
are ridiculous, while other portions are meaningful. A few examples should suffice.
On the ridiculous side, consider this direct quote from the first page following the
copyright page:
"In the translation of The Knowledge Book which has been bestowed on Your Planet as the
Heralder of the World Totality of the Morrows, and of the Golden Age, into different languages at
this moment and in the future years, it will be especially disclosed that the conveyance Source of
the Book is the reality of Unified Humanity Universal Cosmos Unification Totality."
or from page 573:
"The operational Order of each Mini Atomic Whole is equal to the operational Order of the
Gurz System. The 1000 of the 1800 Universes in a Mini Atomic Whole constitute the Directing Staff
of that Mini Atomic Whole. Each Mini Atomic Whole is called a CENTRIFUGAL UNIVERSE."
or from page 921:
"After the 24th century, in Your Planet which will be prepared for a different operation by
the Sextuplet Projection Networks of different Galactic Dimensions, by becoming effective as a Total
(13) Sextuplet Systems, that is, like this (6,6,6,6,6,6,6,6,6,6,6,6,6), the Reality will complete its
Mission and the Feudal Unified Totality of the Lordly Order will take over the Mission. It is
presented for your information.”
When I was a younger, hot-blooded scientist, I would have immediately dismissed
all of this stuff as absolute B.S. In reading further, however, I found that TKB contained
many good principles to live by. Some of these I particularly like are: "The key of our
happiness is in the hands of our consciousness. Happy is the person who compares gold
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with sand. Your goodwill cuts into two, like a sword, the negative currents around you.
Sincerity of heart is worth all the sacred books. The one who does not know Love, can not
gather the Flowers, etc.” TKB is loaded with many good principles, but the book is simply
too big. It uses upper case whenever the mood strikes. I wish its authors had reduced it by
a hundred-fold to its true essence.
Further inspection of TKB reveals that it does endorse modern concepts such as
evolution, cosmology, and the methods of scientific inquiry. On page 404, it states, "Quest
leads You to Thought and Thought leads You to the Truth. Within the Truth there is no
Mystery.” It also combines information received over the "white" alpha channel with a
"black" science beta channel for maximum effectiveness. But why do they have to pack the
material with so much unnecessary verbosity and absurdity? At the end of this chapter, I
promise the reader a very short summary on how we should lead our lives.
Mortimer "Pa" Thompson's Views
I found Great-grandfather Pa's views on religion quite clear and focused, and have
included them here verbatim. Though his formal education was minimal, he proved
himself to be an excellent philosopher (in addition to his many other skills noted in
Chapter I). He was often preoccupied with thoughts about religion and the possible
existence of God. He did not regularly attend church or profess a certain creed, often
arguing vehemently against religious tenets, particularly if he thought his opponent's
arguments were narrow-minded. He actually did believe in God, but he was never certain
exactly why, which bothered him. He searched the Bible for answers, but generally found
only passages that he disputed and tried to prove false.
Pa's most violent disagreements were with religious fundamentalists who wanted
him to believe the Bible literally, word for word. Nor could he turn to any church, for the
church's God of wrath and vengeance was not his God, and he could not believe in a God
who needed constant worship and adoration. One merely has to read the first three of the
ten commandments to appreciate Pa’s viewpoint here. Can the God of the universe be that
insecure? Pa’s wife "Mamsie" and his children were often concerned to hear his strong
views, particularly when he proclaimed that all religions were but figments of the human
mind. But they, like many others who knew and loved Pa, respected his right to express
his views. The following paragraphs are from his personal diary written when he was 78
years old in the year 1936.
“Religions of all kinds have their pitfalls in their efforts to find the relation that
exists between the finite and the infinite, between man and God, or between the
individual and the universe. They adopt a premise consistent with what is, at the time,
known of the world about them. They assume the existence of a god having such human
qualities and impulses as they, themselves, have or aspire to. Upon this floating
foundation they erect the fabric of their theologies, or rather mythologies.”
“The original founders of the principal religions like Lao Tzi, Buddha, Moses, Jesus,
and Muhammad, good and gifted men, very zealous and emotional men, sought only to
induce men to better behavior toward one another. Very little of theology is to be found
in their preachments. It is only when their teaching has become widely accepted that their
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followers think it necessary to organize a church or party or government, and write a
creed, to harness the minds of people into faith and obedience to the edicts of the
organization.”
“Step by step, the center of gravity is shifted from service in the general welfare to
faith and obedience to dogmatic formula -- from the teaching of Jesus to his personality
and an elaborate mythology of myths and miracles established about his person. Just here
is where the trouble begins. The expanding sphere of human knowledge and intelligence
will not put up with myths and miracles, and that's that. Already the nonsense attached to
the personality of Jesus by his followers of the first four centuries has raised doubts that
such a man ever existed at all.”
“The deification of his personality, which he specifically forbade, is made the
central virtue of a Christian, which guarantees that ultimately there will be no Christians,
because an intelligent person must have some assurance that he does exist -- now and
then as God. No such assurance is possible. While one may hold the doctrine ascribed to
him in the highest esteem, whatever his personality may have been, the principles
underlying his doctrine are that the "kingdom of heaven" consists in right living
(righteousness) by human beings toward one another here and now, and not in their
opinions as to his personality. There is a growing idea that the universe is alive and
intelligent, and that the childish deity of the third chapter of Genesis is a myth. I reckon
God knows that, but he is not doing anything about it.”
“Present-day Christianity has for so long overlaid and accustomed itself to ignore
those strange teachings of Jesus from which it arose. It has long since abandoned the task
of achieving the kingdom of heaven, and is preoccupied with resistance to scientific
research in physics, sociology, and political economy. Sunday observance, revivalism, and
a make-believe of arranging for a future life after death -- a sort of
fourth-dimensional existence without body, parts, or passions in a
part of the universe where the ordinary laws of matter are suspended
-- a sort of glorified and endless prayer meeting led by 24 bellowing
bulls and an equal number of Elders of the Billy Sunday and Sam
Jones types. Sister Annie McPherson may also find a place in the
ceremony.”
“My soul is in revolt against that group of ideas which finds
Pa Thompson, self
portrait on palette
expression in such phrases as ‘fear God’, ‘approach the throne of
Grace with fear and trembling’, ‘pray without ceasing’, ‘sacrifice’,
‘praise God’, ‘glorify His holy name’, and all this jargon of pious platitudes that convey the
idea that God is an ignorant and brutish tyrant, a stupid and suspicious ogre, watching
humanity for an opportunity to chuck them into Hell. This groveling before an imaginary
fetish, this universal degradation of humanity, and wholesale slander of God, by
attributing to Him qualities and purposes consistent with the mental attitude of an Aztec
priest engaged in human sacrifices, are to me untenable.”
“What more conclusive proof of the origin of religion than the book of Revelation
furnishes? From the first book to the last it reveals the imagery, mentality, and aspirations
of a down-trodden, suppressed, and ignorant man who has so long endured arbitrary
tyranny that he takes it as a matter of course. Hence, he attributes to deity the same
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motives that he finds in political institutions about him. The saddest thing about it is that
men of today, who should know better, continue to repeat his imbecilities as something
sacred, while all about them are evidences of a nobler, saner, philosophy of life and its
author.”
Pa’s ‘Is There a God?’
“Of course I do not know whether there is a god or not. I think it would be
presumptive of me either to assert or deny the existence of such a being. However, there is
one thing I am reasonably sure of -- that no such being as described in the prevailing
religions of today exists at all. The universe may have a soul or controlling spirit, or there
may be many of them -- there may be a coordination of gods, or the universe may be a
self-contained unit of intelligence, just one thing. This matter is beyond the
comprehension of the human mind, and one can only speculate about it.”
“If there is any god at all, he must be coextensive with the universe itself. He must
be the vital governing principle and functionary throughout all things, from the simplest
to the most complex. Everywhere are evolving individualities in infinite variety.
Everywhere, from molecule to man, the individual stands upon its own autonomy and
adapts itself with its milieu, if it can.”
“It may be that humanity is an emanation from God, and all life on this planet may
be a phase of God and exist somewhat in that relation to God, like the individual cells of
each creature that sustain to that creature. The cells seems to be intelligent and they seem
to be in a sense independent of the individual. They come into life, live a certain time, and
die, while the individual lives on. This process may run throughout the universe, or it may
not. Who knows? When I hear a man dogmatize about the plans of God, I imagine a
conversation between two lymphocytes about what they think about the man in whose
blood stream they run.”
“And another thing. Nowhere in all your experience or observation do you find any
indication whatsoever of a jurisdicial element in nature. There is no revenge anywhere -there are consequences only, but no element of justice or injustice as such. Consequences
flow from every act -- certain, sure, inevitable -- but they can be known and provided for,
so that what threatens calamity can often be turned to advantage. There is nowhere in
nature any idea of punishment or reward. This supports the idea that the whole cosmos is
upon an autonomous basis, and that God respects that autonomy. What we term ‘good’
and ‘bad’ are terms applicable only to ourselves and the fellow creatures about us.”
“God, the infinite, is beyond good and evil. To him they have no significance.
Nothing can occur in the universe that would surprise God, or that was not in the general
scheme of things. Logically this must be so if we reason from the premise that God is the
author of all that is. So far back as we can get any hints of the thoughts of mankind, they
have been prescribing how God should be worshipped. Millions of books and charts have
been written stating just how this should be done. Wars have been fought over it, and
endless argument paraded out about how he should be addressed, when there is not the
slightest indication from him that he wants anything of the sort.”
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“Everyone can verify the truth of this by a moment's reflection on his own
experiences. How often has one sat by the bedside of his feverish child and seen the
disease slowly extinguish the life while he writhed in prayer? All the while God knew of a
tiny pellet that would drive the disease from the blood stream of his child. Nothing doing - he must find the pellet himself. By reason and research he must save himself and those
about him without any help from God -- such is the order of nature. Notwithstanding the
unctuous blather of the priest who only beclouds the issue. The priest claims that we have
the inspired “word of God” in the literature of the Jewish people over several centuries,
but one gets no such idea from reading it.”
“Instead one gets the ideas of a people who have been run over and mauled by
more powerful neighbors -- the Nebuchadnezzars, the Alexanders, the Pharaohs, and the
Caesars -- until the arbitrary tyranny and gross injustice of these wolves have become a
part of their mental processes and they attribute to God the same impulses they observe
in their masters. Men may be enslaved so long and so thoroughly that they take slavery as
a matter of course. Together with all this, the literature is encumbered with a mythology
that is the result of a lack of knowledge of history, geography, and physics. These
conditions make of it hard reading. One has to be continually shoving aside rubbish to get
at the true state of affairs.”
“The Bible establishes the purely human origin of the religion entombed within it. I
can find no assurance that the master of the universe has ever had anything to do with it.
One of its best teacher's dying exclamations was, "My God, why hast thou forsaken me?” It
is a fallacy common to all reformers and religious teachers to assume that, because their
quest is good and goals great, God is necessarily at their disposal. In a sense, the world
and its whole orderly system is at their disposal, but only as they adjust themselves to its
orderly processes and stand on their feet -- not on their knees -- and think. They must
drop wishful and subjective thinking and look at the world objectively, abandoning all
sorts of make-believe except for amusement, poetry, or romance, which still play an
important part in our childish natures -- for most of us are still children.”
“God told Adam that the eating of the forbidden fruit would be the death of him the
very day he ate it. According to the story, Adam lived for nearly a thousand years after
that, just as the snake had said. If there is any truth to this story at all, one might suppose
that this so-called 'fall of man’ was really the very best thing that could have happened to
him. He was thrown out upon his own resources and his progress has been a continual rise
ever since.”
“In nearly every page of Jewish literature -- so called inspired literature -- there is
much complaint from God that he is not getting enough worship and fear. He seems to
accept the fact that there are other gods, and he is greatly disturbed about his priority.
There is much instruction about how he should be worshipped, elaborate specifications
for anointing with pots and pans and candlesticks, but nothing about education or
physics, agriculture, or chemistry, or any of the related sciences. This is another evidence
that the inspired writers were doing the best they could for the betterment of mankind
with the knowledge they had, but they simply did not know anything about these things,
and God was not telling them anything they did not already know. So the inspiration, if
there was any such thing, did not amount to anything.”
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“The greatest help for the spread of knowledge of any kind would be a common
language for all of mankind, but God is shown to have deliberately prevented that for fear
that men would climb into heaven or at least into the firmament, whatever that is. There
were a few thousand men in the Jordan valleys who were favored by God with instruction,
such as it was, but all over the world were hundreds of millions of people who were
inventing religions and gods to the best of their abilities and worshipping as they thought
should be done. They are still at it today. Is it reasonable to assume that God would
neglect all those people when he could inspire them with the true facts, as well as the little
bunch in the Jordan valley?”
“But assuming that my speculations are faulty and that God has some special
predilection for the Jews, then I suppose he still has it. In that case, I prefer to select my
own Jewish teacher of today -- for instance Einstein is a better informed man than Moses,
a better musician than David, a better thinker than St. Paul -- normally he is the peer of
any, ancient or modern. Another thing in his favor - Hitler didn't like him.”
Pa’s Squaring God With Science
“It seems to me that our conceptions of God are continually being revised to square
with new knowledge of physics. Beginning with the rabbit-foot fetish up to the universal
fatherhood, and now it seems more like the impersonal power of gravitation. If one's
prayer is to rise into the stratosphere, the effective way is by means of a balloon filled
with a gas lighter than air. No amount of prayer will avail without the balloon. The
fatherhood idea is beautifully romantic, but it won't work. The balloon does work. A man
need not pray for bread if he has a hoe in his hands. Vigorous use of the hoe will enable
him to dispense with prayer, and God seems to be entirely satisfied with this
arrangement.”
“There is a major fallacy in the conception of God as solicitous for the welfare of his
children. This is gruesomely illustrated in everyday life. Tragedies and heart-rending
incidents continually occur before our eyes. Like the burning of the Rogerville man's cabin
with his two young children trapped inside. God said, 'Suffer the little children to come
onto me, for such is the kingdom of heaven.' Mountains may be removed by prayer, yet
from the burning cabin came the cries of the children, 'Papa, come and get us out.' Papa,
outside and torn with indescribable anguish but unable to reach them, is forced to watch
the flaming roof fall in. The little fellows under the bed hushed their cries, but 'Papa,
come and get us' will haunt his brain until he too is hushed in the oblivion of death.”
“But to those who preach religion, their minds are not swayed by the burning
children. It is as though their religious ideas are detached from the cerebral cortex in an
island ganglion and hence unaffected by the questioning, comparisons, analysis, and
reasoning processes of the cerebrum. Their island ganglion carries on without any
reference to fact or reason. This they call faith, and they lay great store by it.”
“The net result of the first act of worship was disastrous. Cain probably considered
Abel's abuse equivalent to assault and battery. Cain would not endure it and killed him.
God, who knew all about it all the time, gave no hint to any of the family that might have
stopped the row before it started, and comes into the affair to punish Cain, branding him
in such a way as to prevent anyone from injuring him. There was no other man or woman
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in the world at that time except his father and mother. There is nothing in the story to
indicate their hostility. Cain leaves home and marries a woman in another section. Is God
so poor in resources that he could not cope with Cain's jealousy and save the life of an
accepted worshipper?”
“The fact is they can go on throat-cutting down to the last man as far as God cares.
If they can't learn self-governance of themselves, God doesn't want them. They forsake the
Earth and, like other species that have failed, will be obliterated by their own acts. God is
in no hurry. The world is just as he wants it, and we will have to put up with it as it is and
make the best of it.”
Pa’s Red Worm and the Supreme Court
“For 70 years I have pondered this subject. In my youth I tried to fool myself into
accepting it as taught by my teachers, parents, and associates. I adopted a make-believe of
believing it like everybody about me, but day and night it was always before me as a crazy
thing. The psychosis rests upon the delusion that God wants to be feared and worshipped,
which no intelligent man would want, much less the supreme intelligence of the universe.
Imagine the supreme court punishing a red worm for contempt of court. The gap between
the court and the red worm is not wider than the gap between infinite intelligence and a
man. This wholly false premise was through all religions that have come down to us from
primitive barbarism. Hence all their reasoning and consequently all their conclusions are
illogical.”
“The barbarian did not know that the red worm is an important factor in soil
building on this planet, making it possible for all life and the very existence of the
supreme court as well. But the court does know it and, if the constitution will permit, will
rule in favor of the red worm whether the worm is reverential or not. I do not care to push
this illustration of court and worm too far. It does not fit perfectly. The court did not
create red worms. What I'm trying to show is that, because they exist upon two widely
different planes of intelligence, that nothing the worm could do would put the court in a
rage. Neither could the worm understand the function of the court. The worm does not
even know that the court exists at all, and the court has no means of communication that
would teach the worm, simply because the level and purpose of the court is beyond the
range of the worm's intelligence -- that is not to say that the worm has no intelligence at
all.”
“The same is true in the case of man and God. Man has no means of knowing about
God, but that is no proof that God does not exist and, in fact, it is none of his business.
Man's field of action and interest is here on the surface of this particular planet from the
soil of which he arose and to which he will return. What the ultimate, if there is an
ultimate, destiny is we do not know. He can learn something from the worm, the soil
builder. He is much more than a worm, and much more may be expected of him than the
worm, but it is only a matter of degree.”
“Nature, or God, has endowed man with the ability to improve himself beyond that
of any other species, with every faculty that would enable him to be at home in the world.
He is also endowed with the rudiments of a soul which he can nourish or starve as he will.
If he prefers, he can remain in the jungle and practice jungle ethics to the point of
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progressive cannibalism. He can snatch and grab, enslave and kill, strut and pray, grovel
and fear the delusions of his ridden imagination and die like every other beast. Or he can
rise above and beyond all that. There is no limit in what he may become in intelligence
and kindness in the grand manner of ‘do unto others what you would have them do unto
you’.”
“But there is little hope we will make much progress while the legal process that we
now have permits one person to exploit the necessities of another. That involves too much
lying, cheating, war, poverty, and crime to allow any moral health in the world. This is our
own doing and must be undone by ourselves before we can call upon God. It would be an
insult to ask anything of him while we still persisted in the cause of all our troubles. We
must come into court with clean hands. I believe that mankind has but one objective, to
establish as its own, a set of conditions, institutions, and habits which will further its own
well being in consonance with the general operation of Nature. Not for the glory of God at
all, for God does not need glory, God is not in need of anything. God is everything.”
The 25th Templeton Prize Address
This piece of work by Prof. Paul Davies of the University of Adelaide is excellent,
and was the basis for his receiving the Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion on May
3rd, 1995, at Westminster Abbey. As a quantum gravitational physicist, Prof. Davies was
aptly trained to offer his observations about the mathematical and physical laws that
drive the evolution of the universe. Where people often feel that new scientific discoveries
can provide explanations for religious mysteries, filling in the "gaps" that would otherwise
be attributed to God, thereby pushing God further into obscurity, Prof. Davies argues that
we not adopt this viewpoint. By viewing the uniqueness of the whole, he believes that
science and religion can work together to provide a better and more stable understanding
of the two disciplines.
His main theme has to do with how finely tuned the physical laws must be for such
a complex order to have emerged from initial chaos. He marvels at how life has emerged
from inanimate matter, and how consciousness has emerged from life. If the laws driving
the universe were randomly chosen, however, he states that the result would either be
boring simplicity or unchecked chaos. Instead, the real laws seem to result in a universe of
great diversity and interest. But these laws cannot be tweaked by more than a tad without
conditions moving quickly away from the remarkable universe we now share.
Others have also observed that the physical laws seem to have been "contrived" to
make life and consciousness emerge. As an aside, I was surprised that Prof. Davies did not
reference the pivotal paper on this subject presented in 1973 in Poland at the 500th
anniversary of the birth of Copernicus. There, Brandon Carter, an astrophysicist from
Cambridge University, presented a paper entitled “Large Number Coincidences and the
Anthropic Principle in Cosmology,” which contended that all arbitrary constants in
physics seemed designed to allow life to emerge, and that this design had to exist at the
beginning of the creation of the universe.
In the years following the Carter lecture, physicists put forward many calculations
in support of the Carter concept, ranging from gravity to electromagnetism, to the nuclear
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weak and strong forces, to the nature of water, to the synthesis of carbon, and to much
more. The reader may learn more of these calculations in John Leslie's 1989 book entitled
Universes. Prof. Davies finds it very significant that many of the universe's working rules
can be figured out by humans through the scientific method of inquiry, experimentation,
and analysis. He noted that Einstein used to ponder whether God was able to control the
outcome of his creation and, if so, how significant it was that the universe produced such
richness, diversity, and novelty. Are the laws of physics merely thoughts in the mind of
God? Can we one day deduce how mind emerged from matter and, in so doing, predict
what may evolve next? Prof. Davies stops short of directly stating that the uniqueness of
these laws is the evidence for a supreme god, but he does allow the reader to move
towards that conclusion.
In the November 2000 issue of Discover Magazine, there is an excellent article about
the beliefs of Dr. Martin Rees, Britain’s Astronomer Royal. Rees has studied the matter for
several years, and believes that there are six major numbers (out of about two dozen in
total) that underlie the fundamental physical properties of our universe. Furthermore, not
only do these numbers control everything from the vast to the infinitesimal, but they
cannot be altered by more than a few percent or there would be no life as we know it.
These six controlling numbers are the strength of the force binding atomic nuclei; the
ratio of the atomic small forces to those of gravity; the density of material in the universe;
the strength of that force which controls the expansion of the universe; the amplitude of
irregularities in the expanding universe; and the number of spatial dimensions in the
universe. Astronomer Hugh Ross believes that the a’priori odds of randomly getting these
six numbers is just as unlikely as “a Boeing 747 aircraft being completely assembled as a
result of a tornado striking a junkyard.”
So what do we do with Rees’ conjecture which seems to corroborate other scientists
who preceded him? Either a miraculous creation occurred by random chance; a supreme
being created the proper initial conditions for our special universe to be born and evolve;
or there are myriad other universes (multiverses) we do not know, leaving us a member of
the only universe within which we could exist and contemplate ourselves and our
creation. Rees believes in the final interpretation, namely that our universe lies in one tiny
corner of a multiverse space within which many big bangs occurred, but we’ve been
unable to detect these other universes, as they are each constrained to their own
particular space and time. As he puts it, “You happen to be in the right universe.” If only
we could devise some great experiment to detect the presence of any other universes. A
few scientists believe that it is not only theoretically possible, but perhaps practically so
by examining tiny fluctuations in the background radiation.
My own views on this fascinating subject are brief. Such finely tuned laws (assuming
this to be true) would indeed seem to suggest a supreme creator, but is he the Abrahamic
God or otherwise? We cannot know. Also, as we do not know whether random laws were
tried out on vast numbers of other universes, many of which “failed,” we may still be
misinterpreting our uniqueness simply because we are here to raise the question. Are
humans the only truly sentient beings, or do other sentient creatures abound on other
worlds in other universes? How long will humans have to wait until they have teased out
enough new laws to truly “glimpse the face of God,” or are we already glimpsing it in
small doses each day? I do not know, but I am very intrigued by the concepts raised by
Prof. Davies and the other scientists espousing his theory. I believe there is fair evidence
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here to suggest a supreme creator, so I will attempt to fold this concept into my final
views.
Chopra’s “How to Know God”
We referred to this book earlier, but it warrants further discussion here, as it offers
several unique arguments for why God must and does exist. But Chopra needs to answer the
following questions:
1.
Does God respond to prayer in any reliable manner? I do not believe so. It seems to me that
each of us makes our own “luck” through education, love, and responsibility. Further, scientific
studies have shown that God does not respond to prayer … in fact, groups prayed for have fared
worse than those not being prayed for (e.g., the open heart surgery recovery results).
2.
Mathematically, as there are more people being born than are dying, there are not enough
new bodies to take departing souls from the dead ones. Therefore, either new souls must be created
to inhabit the surplus of bodies – or souls must be capable of subdivision to meet the demands – or
reincarnated spirits must also be capable of going into non-human creatures for which there might
be fewer in compensating proportion to the extra number of human bodies. I suppose the simple
answer here is that God does create new spirits (with fresh starts) to inhabit the excess of births over
deaths.
3.
A small child is crippled for life by some accident over which she had absolutely no control.
How does God permit this, that very God who proclaims to love little children? Assume she is too
young to have become a sinner. There are two answers offered – one, that God “moves in mysterious
ways,” which is really a non-answer (but for which your answer tonight on the Larry King show about
the child lost to an alligator would be similar); and two, that she (her reincarnated soul) is being
punished in this life by evil deeds done in a prior life (which would seem a sort of justice). The latter
reason is logical, but what is your explanation?
4.
The human population has nearly reached 7 billion and we are destroying precious habitat
and biodiversity at an alarming rate. Nature has done nothing so bad as to deserve the punishment
we humans are inflicting through selfish commercial interests in the developed nations and through
high birth rates in the developing nations. Great forests, wetlands, and jungles are being cleared at
an enormous rate. How do you explain this tragic situation, with species becoming extinct at a rate
1000x times faster (per E. O. Wilson) than ever before? Is God just watching out of idle curiosity as
man makes this grave error?
5.
As a final thought, though a bit irreverent, an article by Barry Goldman in the 1/3/2010 Los
Angeles Times entitled “Leaps of Faith” makes several points based upon a poll by the Pew Research
Center’s Forum on Religion and Public Life. It seems that Americans engage in many different
religious practices, mixing elements of different traditions. These include beliefs (or not) in
reincarnation, astrology, a supreme being, spiritual energy in physical objects, communicating with
ghosts, and various types of hocus pocus … with many people believing what they wish without
regard to what few facts may exist on the matter. People are losing the ability to even agree upon
what constitutes a “fact.” Over 85% of Americans hold assorted religious beliefs with God playing a
major role in each of their spiritual models but, as Goldman says, “We are becoming a nation of
fruitcakes.” This of course makes it all the more important to live responsibly, regardless of one’s
particular religious views.
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My Concluding Views
No one can prove whether a supreme Creator exists or whether pure chance and
opportunity have always ruled. We are all allowed to believe as we see fit. There are both
atheists and devoted religious followers -– and all shades of gray in between. There are
really two probabilities that should be discussed. The first concerns whether the creator is
the God referred to in the Christian Bible, and the second concerns whether there is any
form of Creator at all. When first setting out on the journey to write this chapter, I had
hoped to collect enough information on the Christian god question to be able to obtain a
Bayesian probability estimate for the existence of such a god as implied by “facts”
surrounding such matters as unique prophesies that later came true, the possible
discovery of Noah’s ark, the shroud of Turin origins, any confirmed miracles such as the
resurrection of Christ, remnants of the great flood, etc. But all of these signposts have
both religious supporters and scientific naysayers. So I could get about any answer from
the Bayesian process as governed by the input probabilities. For me, the absence of any
unique prophesy that later came true (without excessive hindsight interpretations by
religious supporters) finally convinced me that the probability of the Christian god’s
actual existence as the father of Jesus Christ and the creator of the universe is likely
smaller than 10%.
On the second matter about some possible Creator of the universe, if absolutely
forced to take a position on the matter, I am about equally divided between no supreme
Creator at all vs a Creator which may have set the universe into motion some 15 billion
years ago by creating the Big Bang, from which a brilliantly designed set of physical laws
have driven the resulting process to produce all that we know. This creation was done as
an inspired experiment by this Creator. Whether the Creator knew that he/she/it would,
or would not, live long enough to see how it all turned out, I do not know. The unfolding
process is not deterministic but, like chaos theory, can follow a number of different paths
depending upon the outcomes of many chance events and the application of intelligence
and free will by the universe’s life forms. Many of these life forms can and will evolve to
progressively higher states of knowledge, power, and awareness, almost without limit, as
long as they do not end their own existence. They can determine their destinies to a large
extent, but will likely make too many irreversible mistakes to allow positive destinies for
all creatures.
The form of a possible Creator is totally unknown and can be without gender or
human likeness –- perhaps even like pure energy. This experiment is being conducted in a
single universe -– the one that we believe we know. It is the responsibility of the most
advanced species to manage the evolution of their portion of the universe in a form of
stewardship which maximizes their chances for survival and advancement to higher
awareness levels. These higher levels are not precluded by the Creator’s laws. From time
to time, the Creator may introduce small “vernier adjustments” to the evolving universe to
keep it interesting. After-death heaven and hell, as suggested in the Christian bible, do not
exist. Creatures are not condemned by the Creator for evil deeds, but the natural laws are
constructed such that evil deeds will not, in the long run, assure steady evolution to
higher levels of awareness. It is essential that the most advanced species always exercise
responsible stewardship. Everything is interconnected in a wonderfully powerful way that
must not be damaged. Truly unique prophesies are not possible by anyone, including
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even the Creator, who can make only good statistical predictions. The Creator might be
able to produce “miracles” if desired, but rarely does so and for reasons we cannot guess.
Thus, it is the responsibility of humans to manage and preserve their planet with
extreme care; to advance their knowledge and capabilities in all endeavors from the arts
to the sciences to the workings of the human mind; and to become all that they can be.
This process may be accelerated by networking the human race to pursue both the human
genome and human memome projects as soon as possible. This course of action will
always be optimal, independent of whether a Creator exists or not, and should therefore
be followed by humans of all religious faiths. In a nutshell -- lead an ethical life; become
educated and use this knowledge well; listen to your heart; serve as the lead steward in
our portion of the universe; avoid greed and uncontrolled growth; and establish a clear
value system to guide future actions. Simplify this overall process to unburden it from
politics and from overly complex and tedious conditions and routines like those now
operating in most of the developed countries. Regularly evaluate how the evolution of the
human race is proceeding and, when judged wanting, take immediate remedial steps.
Always be aware of the beauty around you, and always act to preserve it. If you need a
religion to guide you, let these principles form its tenets (regarding stewardship of Earth,
we are already failing miserably on this front).
Suppose that the Creator cannot live forever -– but that he/she/it is driven to
produce an “offspring” to manage the future of his/her/its grand experiment. An
offspring that can understand how it all worked, and where it can be improved. What
better offspring could be chosen than one which has evolved over millions of years to
understand the workings of the universe and to know how to make it better. Perhaps the
new Creator will arise one day from an advanced species in a galaxy far, far away. Then
again, perhaps the new Creator will evolve from our own future descendants. If that is at
all a possibility, even a remote one, it places an enormous responsibility on the human
race to get their act together. At the moment, we have promise, but we are doing many
critical things terribly wrong. It is my wish that the memes expressed in this book be taken
to heart so that we do not blow such a grand opportunity. It would be tragic to fail in our
stewardship role and in the promise of untold futures of greatness. We must not wait for
things to get better –- we must “make it so” every day.
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