Did Marco Polo Lie?

From *The Skeptical Review*, 1996/July-August:

by Farrell Till

We often hear biblicists argue that there is as much proof for the historicity of Jesus and the events attributed to him in the New Testament as there is for the existence of Julius Caesar and other historical characters. They claim that those who reject biblical characters and events have no logical basis for accepting anything that we have learned through historical records. A recent controversy surrounding a well known historical character will illustrate the erroneous thinking of those who so argue.

Family Values (1 of 5))

From *The Skeptical Review*, 1996 / September-October:

by Farrell Till

We hear a lot these days about family values. The Christian right has made this such an issue that political candidates have been conditioned to believe that mentioning family values frequently in their campaign speeches is an easy way to score points with voters. Of course, if a candidate also associates "family values" with the so-called biblical principles on which our country was founded, he is certain to score even more points with the Christian right. It has become a cheap way to get votes.

Talk to the Animals

Number 17 of 17 in the *Twilight Zone*series:

A silly tale about a talking donkey.

by Farrell Till

A popular movie last year [1996], which even received an academy-award nomination for best picture, was Babe, a story about a talking pig. Even with animated cartoons aside, talking animals have not been at all uncommon in movies and TV. Years ago we had Francis, the talking mule, and later came Mister Ed. Doctor Dolittle, a movie about a man with a special affinity with animals, even gave us the popular song "Talk to the Animals."

Child Abuse Yahweh's Way

Number 16 of 17 in the *Twilight Zone* series:
A great "hero of faith" considered loyalty to an oath more important than the life of his own daughter.

by Farrell Till

Only in the Twilight Zone of biblical times could one become a "hero of faith" by killing his daughter in order to keep a foolish oath. In in our last trek through the twilight zone, we saw that vows were serious business in those days. None of the Israelite fathers, for example, felt free to give their daughters in marriage to the 600 males who had survived the massacre of the Benjamites, because "the men of Israel had sworn an oath at Mizpah, saying, `None of us shall give his daughter to Benjamin as a wife'" (Judges 21:1). In the law of Moses, it was written, "When you make a vow to Yahweh your God, you shall not delay to pay it; for Yahweh your God will surely require it of you, and it would be sin to you.... That which has gone from your lips you shall keep and perform, for you voluntarily vowed to Yahweh your God what you have promised with your mouth" (Deut. 23:21,23).

Pioneers of Loophole Religion

Number 15 of 17 in the *Twilight Zone* series:
The Israelite rationalization of a problem they had created shows that loophole religion is as old as the Bible.

by Farrell Till

Our last trip into the Twilight Zone left God's chosen people grappling with a terrible problem. They themselves had virtually wiped out the tribe of Benjamin in a battle described in Judges 20, only to realize that they were responsible for practically destroying a tribe of Yahweh's pet nation Israel. Six hundred had survived the Benjamite massacre, but these were all males, soldiers, who had retreated to the rock of Rimmon (20:47). Our last trip found the Israelites in the "house of God" pondering what they could do to rebuild the tribe of Benjamin. They couldn't give their own daughters to the Benjamite survivors, because they had sworn with an oath at Mizpah before the massacre that "(n)one of us shall give his daughter to Benjamin as a wife" (21:1,7), and neither could the Benjamite survivors violate Yahweh's holy law and marry foreign women (Dt. 7:3-4; Ex. 34:12-13).

The Last Hurrah of the Inerrancy Doctrine

From *The Skeptical Review*, 1990 / Jan.-Feb. Issue:

by Farrell Till

Many fundamentalist Christians sincerely believe that the Bible is the verbally inspired word of God. As believers in verbal inspiration, they see the Bible much differently from those who respect it as a book with only concepts and ideas that were divinely inspired. Christians who believe in the doctrine of verbal inspiration think that God directed the writing of the Bible on a word-by-word basis so that the authors of the original manuscripts were protected from writing even as much as one word that might inadvertently mislead readers or incorrectly communicate the truths God wanted man to know.

The Evolution Of God

From *The Skeptical Review*, 2000 / Nov.-Dec. Issue:

By Farrell Till 

Biblical writers seemed unable to make up their minds about the nature of their god. In one passage, he is given a trait that contradicts the nature attributed to him in another. To some writers God was omnipresent, i. e., simultaneously present everywhere

Where can I go from your spirit? Or where can I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there; if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there. If I take the wings of the morning and settle at the farthest limits of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me fast (Psalm 139:7-8).

To others, his presence was limited, and so he had to go from place to place as the need arose. When the descendants of the flood survivors were building a tower to heaven, "Yahweh came down to see the city and the tower" (Gen. 11:5), whereas an omnipresent entity would have had no need to "come down," since he would have already been present at the construction site. Prior to this, Adam and Eve, having broken Yahweh's command not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, heard Yahweh "walking in the garden in the cool of the day" and "hid themselves from the presence of Yahweh God among the trees of the garden" (Gen. 3:8). Hiding from an omnipresent deity would have been impossible, so, unlike the psalmist quoted above, the writer of this story must have seen Yahweh as a god whose presence was limited to a specific location at any given time. When Yahweh exiled Cain for killing his brother Abel, for example, the Genesis writer said that "Cain went out from the presence of Yahweh" (4:16), but if Cain went out from the presence of Yahweh, then Yahweh could hardly have been an omnipresent entity. Other biblical passages restricted Yahweh's presence in the same way, whereas others agreed with the psalmist who thought that God was omnipresent. The prophet Amos declared that no one could escape from Yahweh's wrath. Though they dug into Sheol, his hand would take them; though they climbed into heaven, he would bring them down; though they hid themselves on the top of Carmel, he would find them; though they hid in the bottom of the sea, he would command the serpent to bite them (Amos 9:2-3). There was just no place for Yahweh's enemies to flee from his presence, yet other writers presented him as a deity restricted in space. The Israelites, for example, thought that God sat enthroned on the mercy seat that was on the ark of the covenant (Ps. 80:1; 99:1; Ex. 25:22; Num. 7:89; 1 Sam. 4:4).