Why Should Anyone Care What the Bible Says?

[POI]

For eons, theists will quote Scripture, with the presupposition that it is authoritative in some kind of way. I contend that the Bible is no better or worse than any other collection of writings. Meaning, it may appear to have some 'good' things to say, some 'bad' things to say, some 'strange' things to say, some 'wrong' things to say, some untenable things to say, some contradictory things to say, etc etc etc....

Any of us can produce passages and quotes from anyone, or any publication. To many, the Bible is just another one of those tools for use, where applicable.

For Debate:

Why should one more-so care what the Bible says? Is it because....

1. It is the inspired word of God? If so, how do you know?

2. Another reason(s)? If so, what, and why does this make anyone care what the Bible says?

[brunumb]

Why should one more-so care what the Bible says?

That's easy. The Bible has had an unrivaled impact on western culture.

Rivaled now by the likes of TikTok and Twitter. They've all had an impact, but that has not necessarily been for the better.

[Miles]

Why should one more-so care what the Bible says?

That's easy. The Bible has had an unrivaled impact on western culture.

And as Sun Tzu said in his classic The Art of War, "Know your enemy and know yourself and you can fight a thousand battles without disaster."


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[Purple Knight]

Why should one more-so care what the Bible says? Is it because....

1. It is the inspired word of God? If so, how do you know?

2. Another reason(s)? If so, what, and why does this make anyone care what the Bible says?

As an atheist I care because a disproportionate amount of people believe it, or at least, because it has shaped their beliefs about morality.

I care what everyone thinks about morality, and if I'm among people whose morality is at least shaped by the Bible, I ought to care about the Bible.

Turn the other cheek is a very, very early example of non-grudgy, universal, no-strings forgiveness, and I think it ought to have respect, especially since this idea that you should never harm your attacker in return and just let him keep attacking you has only just caught on in the last few decades.

[historia]

Why should one more-so care what the Bible says?

That's easy. The Bible has had an unrivaled impact on western culture.

In fact, it's influence is so deeply felt in western societies that those who are secular, or even anti-religious, continue to be influenced by Christian ideals that stem ultimately from the Bible.

Impact in what way?

I'll repeat a few comments I've made elsewhere on this site: For an entertaining treatment of this topic, consider Dominion: How the Christian Revolution Remade the World (2019), by the popular historian Tom Holland (himself an atheist).

The dusk jacket summarizes his essential thesis neatly:

Today, the West is utterly saturated by Christian assumptions. Close-up, the division between a skeptic and a believer may seem unbridgeable. Widen the focus, though, and Christianity's enduring impact can be seen in the emergence of much that has been cast as its nemesis: science, secularism, and even atheism. Christianity is the principle reason why, today, we think it nobler to suffer than to inflict suffering; why we assume every human life to be of equal value.

Some other provocative points from pg. 496 & 538, respectively:

That every human being possessed an equal dignity was not remotely self-evident a truth. A Roman would have laughed at it.

To campaign against discrimination on the grounds of gender or sexuality, however, was to depend on large numbers of people sharing in a common assumption: that everyone possessed an inherent worth.

The origins of this principle -- as Neitzsche had so contemptuously pointed out -- lay not in the French Revolution, nor in the Declaration of Independence, nor in the Enlightenment, but in the Bible.

The primary dogma of humanism -- "that morality is an intrinsic part of human nature based on understanding and a concern for others" -- found no more corroboration in science than did the dogma of the Nazis that anyone not fit for life should be exterminated. The wellspring of humanist values lay not in reason, not in evidence-based thinking, but in history.

Indeed, one of the more vivid ways to see how clearly Christianity has influenced Western society is to look at the writings of Neitzsche and especially his later Nazi admirers, like Himmler, as they explicitly wanted to reject Christian morality, with its concern for the weak and oppressed, and replace it with an older, pre-Christian ethic that favored the powerful.

The concerns you and Joey raised about the Bible's influence are themselves grounded in Christian ideals derived from the Bible, ironically enough.

[JoeyKnothead]

...
Indeed, one of the more vivid ways to see how clearly Christianity has influenced Western society is to look at the writings of Neitzsche and especially his later Nazi admirers, like Himmler, as they explicitly wanted to reject Christian morality, with its concern for the weak and oppressed, and replace it with an older, pre-Christian ethic that favored the powerful.

For me, it's "most vivid" that Christianity brought us the attempted genocide of whole classes of human beings. But I guess Nietzsche is "more vivid" to some than the Holocaust being perpetrated by Christians is to others.

The concerns you and Joey raised about the Bible's influence are themselves grounded in Christian ideals derived from the Bible, ironically enough.

"Indeed", indeedly, my concern about the Bible's influence is grounded in "Christian ideals" of annihilation of any class of people the Christian, or their god, don't like.

[TRANSPONDER]

Why should one more-so care what the Bible says?

That's easy. The Bible has had an unrivaled impact on western culture.

In fact, it's influence is so deeply felt in western societies that those who are secular, or even anti-religious, continue to be influenced by Christian ideals that stem ultimately from the Bible.

Impact in what way?

I'll repeat a few comments I've made elsewhere on this site: For an entertaining treatment of this topic, consider Dominion: How the Christian Revolution Remade the World (2019), by the popular historian Tom Holland (himself an atheist).

The dusk jacket summarizes his essential thesis neatly:

Today, the West is utterly saturated by Christian assumptions. Close-up, the division between a skeptic and a believer may seem unbridgeable. Widen the focus, though, and Christianity's enduring impact can be seen in the emergence of much that has been cast as its nemesis: science, secularism, and even atheism. Christianity is the principle reason why, today, we think it nobler to suffer than to inflict suffering; why we assume every human life to be of equal value.

Some other provocative points from pg. 496 & 538, respectively:

That every human being possessed an equal dignity was not remotely self-evident a truth. A Roman would have laughed at it.

To campaign against discrimination on the grounds of gender or sexuality, however, was to depend on large numbers of people sharing in a common assumption: that everyone possessed an inherent worth.

The origins of this principle -- as Neitzsche had so contemptuously pointed out -- lay not in the French Revolution, nor in the Declaration of Independence, nor in the Enlightenment, but in the Bible.

The primary dogma of humanism -- "that morality is an intrinsic part of human nature based on understanding and a concern for others" -- found no more corroboration in science than did the dogma of the Nazis that anyone not fit for life should be exterminated. The wellspring of humanist values lay not in reason, not in evidence-based thinking, but in history.

Indeed, one of the more vivid ways to see how clearly Christianity has influenced Western society is to look at the writings of Neitzsche and especially his later Nazi admirers, like Himmler, as they explicitly wanted to reject Christian morality, with its concern for the weak and oppressed, and replace it with an older, pre-Christian ethic that favored the powerful.

The concerns you and Joey raised about the Bible's influence are themselves grounded in Christian ideals derived from the Bible, ironically enough.

I think that's the limitation, not to say, the problem. Morality and ethics have been either based on the teachings and beliefs of religion or attempts by philosophers to do it objectively (and been forced to drink hemlock for it). The attempts to blame godlessness for the excesses of dictators have never washed with me because it was never atheism as such that directed their actions, but a Dogma, which with the communists was not having room for theism but with the Nazis, it certainly did but, telllingly showing about what was really going on, the religion had to play ball with the dogma and the dictator. If it did, it was fine, if not, elimination. And we see the same thing with dictatorships today, and you may see the authoritarian rule virtually indistinguishable from the former atheist and marxist one but now capitalist and permitting religion.

I don't need to post the video (but I will ) to make this point, but I do need to make my point about Nietzsche which I can always seem to spell no matter how hard I try not to. Christian apologists labour to make him seem to sorta - recant from atheism as without God, there are no morals.

I will refrain from comments about Nietzsche or any other philosophers, but will make an analogy with science. Ptolemy was brilliant to abandon the snowdome cosmos and devise a solar system, though still geocentric, and Eratosthenes, wasn't it showed the earth was spherical, not flat as was thought up to then (1) Brahe was a fine scientist but he didn't know the sun was the centre of the system, and Copernicus didn't know it was based on elliptical rather than circular orbits. Each had their limitations, not because they were dumb, but because the research knowledge was lacking.

This is the problem that Nietzsche had. He (like Jefferson and a number of smart cookies before) could not imagine where morals came from if not God, just as before Darwin, they could not imagine an alternative to intelligent creation.

Now we know about DNA and instinct as the blob or cells of social ethics and morality; and if Nietzsche had known what we know now about the origins and evolution of morality, the lack of Bible or its' god would no more have bothered him than it bothers me.

(1) which is the main reason to think the world and cosmos of the Bible envisages a Babylonian flat earth and sky -dome, and not one that fits current science.

[historia]

This is the problem that Nietzsche had. He (like Jefferson and a number of smart cookies before) could not imagine where morals came from if not God, just as before Darwin, they could not imagine an alternative to intelligent creation.

Now we know about DNA and instinct as the blob or cells of social ethics and morality; and if Nietzsche had known what we know now about the origins and evolution of morality, the lack of Bible or its' god would no more have bothered him than it bothers me.

I'm not sure what you mean by this, TRANSPONDER. Nietzsche didn't think morals came from God -- he was an atheist after all.

Rather, he recognized that some western ethical ideas, like concern for the weak and marginalized, come down to us from Christianity and ultimately the Bible -- which, needless to say, he attributed to men. Those specific ethical ideas are not universal. And Nietzche wanted to reject them in favor of a more distinctly pre-Christian ethical ideal.

I guess Nietzsche is "more vivid" to some than the Holocaust being perpetrated by Christians is to others.

The Holocaust was directed by Nazi leaders who explicitly rejected Christian morality in favor of a pre-Christian ideal that favored the powerful -- essentially, an exaggerated version of Nietzche's view.

To their eternal shame, many German Christians went along with that scheme. As is obvious from history, Christians don't always live up to the Christian ideal that all people possess an inherit moral worth, and will all too frequently succumb to more base human instincts and prejudices. But, as Holland argues in his book, it's precisely because those of us living in western societies share the Christian concept that all people possess an inherit moral worth that we criticize them for their actions.

[TRANSPONDER]

This is the problem that Nietzsche had. He (like Jefferson and a number of smart cookies before) could not imagine where morals came from if not God, just as before Darwin, they could not imagine an alternative to intelligent creation.

Now we know about DNA and instinct as the blob or cells of social ethics and morality; and if Nietzsche had known what we know now about the origins and evolution of morality, the lack of Bible or its' god would no more have bothered him than it bothers me.

I'm not sure what you mean by this, TRANSPONDER. Nietzsche didn't think morals came from God -- he was an atheist after all.

Rather, he recognized that some western ethical ideas, like concern for the weak and marginalized, come down to us from Christianity and ultimately the Bible -- which, needless to say, he attributed to men. Those specific ethical ideas are not universal. And Nietzche wanted to reject them in favor of a more distinctly pre-Christian ethical ideal.

I guess Nietzsche is "more vivid" to some than the Holocaust being perpetrated by Christians is to others.

The Holocaust was directed by Nazi leaders who explicitly rejected Christian morality in favor of a pre-Christian ideal that favored the powerful -- essentially, an exaggerated version of Nietzche's view.

To their eternal shame, many German Christians went along with that scheme. As is obvious from history, Christians don't always live up to the Christian ideal that all people possess an inherit moral worth, and will all too frequently succumb to more base human instincts and prejudices. But, as Holland argues in his book, it's precisely because those of us living in western societies share the Christian concept that all people possess an inherit moral worth that we criticize them for their actions.

i
Of course Nietzsche didn't believe in God but though that if 'God was Dead' and people didn't believe - where would morals come from? Mind, you have a point that he must have thought it came from man, but probably bought it that it was an ad hoc system that was so ramshackle that it needed religion - based moral codes to make it stick. I think that understanding it better means that we can work with what we have (an evolved instinct) and not panic because it isn't reliable (the opinions of an invisible dictator put in an ancient book). I ain't sayin' he was dumb, but he was short on some information.

Now I am not going to blame Christians for not living up to the Christian moral code, No more than a Christian would blame an atheist for not working out the evidence and logic perfectly. No, the fault is with the Religious morality which is fundamentally flawed. This idea that there is or ought to be a universal cosmic morality that is objective and immutable. It is because morals are subjective and relative that we can scrap the old ones and adopt the better. at least, that's the idea. The wrong one with knowledge as well as morals. That it is changing and evolving is a benefit and refusing to budge because it is immutable is not the best way to go, in either case.

[JoeyKnothead]

...

I guess Nietzsche is "more vivid" to some than the Holocaust being perpetrated by Christians is to others.

The Holocaust was directed by Nazi leaders who explicitly rejected Christian morality in favor of a pre-Christian ideal that favored the powerful -- essentially, an exaggerated version of Nietzche's view.

To their eternal shame, many German Christians went along with that scheme. As is obvious from history, Christians don't always live up to the Christian ideal that all people possess an inherit moral worth, and will all too frequently succumb to more base human instincts and prejudices. But, as Holland argues in his book, it's precisely because those of us living in western societies share the Christian concept that all people possess an inherit moral worth that we criticize them for their actions.

So you admit that Christians are just as capable of committing atrocities as their god. Thus we have no reason to conclude their influence is some great good for which the world should be extra super proud.

I absolutely reject the statement, or implication, that my values are derived from Christianity. I have no problem with the existence of Jews, or adulterers, or homosexuals, or trans people, or poly-cotton blends.

That Christian values may fall, stumbling backwards, into the same direction as my own values is specifically because people had to fight and die for the right to shake off the Christian oppression the western world so happily forced upon all it encountered - and the fight continues to this day, with issues like reproductive freedom and the right to express and live one's sexual identity.

We've been having to drag Christians, and their leaders, into the last century for the past several hundred centuries, it's time we give up this idea that Christianity is some kind of driver of the best of humanity.

[historia]

Thus we have no reason to conclude their influence is some great good for which the world should be extra super proud.

No one is arguing that we should celebrate everything Christians have ever done.

I absolutely reject the statement, or implication, that my values are derived from Christianity.

No one is arguing that all of your values are derived from Christianity.

Rather, the point Holland is making -- which I take to be widely shared by historians, and is in no way controversial -- is that some of the most deeply held moral assumptions that people in western society possess, such as the belief that all people have an inherit moral worth, have come down to us from Christianity, and ultimately the Bible.

I can appreciate that some critics of Christianity might not like that fact. But I have yet to see an argument in this thread that Holland is wrong in this historical assessment.