Religious musings
Jun. 1st, 2007 04:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
viverraI don't post a whole lot. I've never gotten the hang of using this as a sort of postcard to my friends. Instead, I use it more to write editorial-style reactions to things. Or just talk about something that intrigues or bothers me.
Religion fascinates me. Unfortunately, much of what is evil in the world seems to be done in the name of doing good, or at least in the name of what someone thinks God wants them to do.
This essay presupposes a fairly normal (whatever that is) idea of God in the American Christian sense. On we go.
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A few weeks ago, I was at a Church breakfast, and we were discussing how to figure out what God wants us to do. Some people talked about following what it says in the Bible, which is really hard to do because the Bible contradicts itself. (If you don't think so, you haven't been reading it closely). So how do you decide what parts of the Bible to take seriously? Usually people rely on what some preacher says. So how do you decide which preacher to follow?
And then someone asked, "why do we have prophets and preachers at all? Why doesn't God just tell each of us directly what he wants of us?" The talk turned to having faith and belief and obedience. But the question gobsmacked me.
I should mention that I've never been comfortable with the traditional Christian idea of God. I took a Talmud course once, which approached the Bible as a collection of teaching stories. The value of the stories lies in what you discover for yourself as you discuss and debate them. Improbable stories which illustrate questionable morals are not there so you can 'have faith and believe'; just the contrary. They are there so that, by examining the shades of grey, you can discover for yourself what is meant by black or white. This made a lot of sense to me; as a teacher, I know that this is a good way to teach intangibles.
For instance, how do you teach the idea of beauty? You could simply show a bunch of beautiful things, and say 'this is beauty'. But that doesn't teach the concept of beauty; it just presents examples. To internalize the concept, it works far better to show something that may or may not be beautiful, and discuss in what ways it is beautiful and in what ways it fails to achieve beauty. The process of examination and thought develops the ability to discern beauty far better than just presenting examples does.
So -- back to the question -- why doesn't God just tell us what he wants us to do? Free will, said some. But free will is the answer to why God doesn't impose his will; it's no excuse for not making his will clear. Some replied he did make his will clear; he gave us the Bible. But that's not clear either; first someone has to tell you that it is the will of God (God doesn't whisper it in your ear), then you have to read it in whatever translation and decide what God really meant by saying certain things, and finally even if this is the word of God, what does that say about what you are supposed to do. Meanwhile others saying other things are really the will of God. If the will of God were clear, then discerning God's will would not even be a question. It is a question, so the will of God is not clear, QED. Certainly God has the ability to tell each and every person on Earth what he wants by direct revelation. So if what God wants us is for us to obey his will, why doesn't he just tell us what his will is?
It seems uncomfortably like having a relationship with someone who communicates with you by leaving messages with other people. He knows that these people sometimes garble the message, as in a game of telephone. But if you don't understand his message, it's somehow your fault.
I'm sorry, but this is passive-aggressive behavior. When the stakes include the fate of one's soul, it approaches psychopathic proportions. If God wants our obedience, but won't tell each of us clearly what he wants, yet punishes failure with damnation -- then it is logical to conclude that God is insane.
If we assume God is good, then there must be another reason for his not simply telling us what he wants. The reason that makes sense to me is the same as the Talmudic approach to the Bible. God wants us to figure out for ourselves what is right, and by so doing grow up. As long as we are simply obeying him, we will not grow up.
Think of a child. As long as the reason a child obeys is "because I said so!", that child is still a child. Part of growing up is challenging rules, making mistakes, and learning to take responsibility for the consequences of your actions. If your grown-up child obeys you, he does so not because it is your will but because he has evaluated the options and has chosen to do what you want; what was your will is now also his will. And if your grown-up child does something else, it is because you and he have come to different conclusions as to what is best.
To develop that capacity to evaluate, it may -- possibly -- be necessary to be less clear about what is wanted. Imagine a teenager who wants to go to a party but has homework to do. You want him to do his homework, and you could just order him to stay home and do his homework. But you also want him to learn to take responsibility for his actions, and that lesson is frankly more important than just getting his homework done. So you take the risk that he may not do your will; you just remind him that his education is important. He may take the hint and stay home. Or he may go party and have to get up early to finish the homework, or he may fail to do the homework and have to face the academic consequences. Each of these is a lesson, and in fact, the lessons from not doing your will may be more maturing in the long run than obedience would be.
This is the only reason I can see for God not making his will clear. More than he wants our obedience, he wants us to just grow up. And that won't happen unless we challenge and question what we think he might want, and make up our own minds.
And he certainly doesn't want us to simply obey people who claim to be speaking in his name.
==================
Religion fascinates me. Unfortunately, much of what is evil in the world seems to be done in the name of doing good, or at least in the name of what someone thinks God wants them to do.
This essay presupposes a fairly normal (whatever that is) idea of God in the American Christian sense. On we go.
=============
A few weeks ago, I was at a Church breakfast, and we were discussing how to figure out what God wants us to do. Some people talked about following what it says in the Bible, which is really hard to do because the Bible contradicts itself. (If you don't think so, you haven't been reading it closely). So how do you decide what parts of the Bible to take seriously? Usually people rely on what some preacher says. So how do you decide which preacher to follow?
And then someone asked, "why do we have prophets and preachers at all? Why doesn't God just tell each of us directly what he wants of us?" The talk turned to having faith and belief and obedience. But the question gobsmacked me.
I should mention that I've never been comfortable with the traditional Christian idea of God. I took a Talmud course once, which approached the Bible as a collection of teaching stories. The value of the stories lies in what you discover for yourself as you discuss and debate them. Improbable stories which illustrate questionable morals are not there so you can 'have faith and believe'; just the contrary. They are there so that, by examining the shades of grey, you can discover for yourself what is meant by black or white. This made a lot of sense to me; as a teacher, I know that this is a good way to teach intangibles.
For instance, how do you teach the idea of beauty? You could simply show a bunch of beautiful things, and say 'this is beauty'. But that doesn't teach the concept of beauty; it just presents examples. To internalize the concept, it works far better to show something that may or may not be beautiful, and discuss in what ways it is beautiful and in what ways it fails to achieve beauty. The process of examination and thought develops the ability to discern beauty far better than just presenting examples does.
So -- back to the question -- why doesn't God just tell us what he wants us to do? Free will, said some. But free will is the answer to why God doesn't impose his will; it's no excuse for not making his will clear. Some replied he did make his will clear; he gave us the Bible. But that's not clear either; first someone has to tell you that it is the will of God (God doesn't whisper it in your ear), then you have to read it in whatever translation and decide what God really meant by saying certain things, and finally even if this is the word of God, what does that say about what you are supposed to do. Meanwhile others saying other things are really the will of God. If the will of God were clear, then discerning God's will would not even be a question. It is a question, so the will of God is not clear, QED. Certainly God has the ability to tell each and every person on Earth what he wants by direct revelation. So if what God wants us is for us to obey his will, why doesn't he just tell us what his will is?
It seems uncomfortably like having a relationship with someone who communicates with you by leaving messages with other people. He knows that these people sometimes garble the message, as in a game of telephone. But if you don't understand his message, it's somehow your fault.
I'm sorry, but this is passive-aggressive behavior. When the stakes include the fate of one's soul, it approaches psychopathic proportions. If God wants our obedience, but won't tell each of us clearly what he wants, yet punishes failure with damnation -- then it is logical to conclude that God is insane.
If we assume God is good, then there must be another reason for his not simply telling us what he wants. The reason that makes sense to me is the same as the Talmudic approach to the Bible. God wants us to figure out for ourselves what is right, and by so doing grow up. As long as we are simply obeying him, we will not grow up.
Think of a child. As long as the reason a child obeys is "because I said so!", that child is still a child. Part of growing up is challenging rules, making mistakes, and learning to take responsibility for the consequences of your actions. If your grown-up child obeys you, he does so not because it is your will but because he has evaluated the options and has chosen to do what you want; what was your will is now also his will. And if your grown-up child does something else, it is because you and he have come to different conclusions as to what is best.
To develop that capacity to evaluate, it may -- possibly -- be necessary to be less clear about what is wanted. Imagine a teenager who wants to go to a party but has homework to do. You want him to do his homework, and you could just order him to stay home and do his homework. But you also want him to learn to take responsibility for his actions, and that lesson is frankly more important than just getting his homework done. So you take the risk that he may not do your will; you just remind him that his education is important. He may take the hint and stay home. Or he may go party and have to get up early to finish the homework, or he may fail to do the homework and have to face the academic consequences. Each of these is a lesson, and in fact, the lessons from not doing your will may be more maturing in the long run than obedience would be.
This is the only reason I can see for God not making his will clear. More than he wants our obedience, he wants us to just grow up. And that won't happen unless we challenge and question what we think he might want, and make up our own minds.
And he certainly doesn't want us to simply obey people who claim to be speaking in his name.
==================
