Where Christianity Errs: A Fair and Clear Philosophical Assessment

By Richard Schoenig

Where Christianity Errs comprises a group of essays that aim to carefully, clearly, fairly, and without rancor argue that Christianity has significantly erred in some of its important beliefs and activities. Among the topics assessed are original sin, prayer, faith, hell, the meaning of life, Christian apologetics, Christian ethics, Christianity and politics, and Christianity and atheism. This book contains novel arguments and insights that will be of interest to non-specialists as well as those who have some background in religion and the philosophy of religion.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Wipf and Stock
• Release date: Apr 4, 2024
• ISBN: 9798385205943

Book preview

Part I: Critiques of Select Aspects of Christian Beliefs

Chapter 1: Original Sin: Can’t Live With It; Can’t Live Without It

Chapter 2: Petitionary and Thanksgiving Prayer: Innocuous but Pointless

Chapter 3: Religious Faith: A Peek Behind the Curtain

Chapter 4: Does God Send People to Hell?

Chapter 5: How to Assure Christian Salvation through Murder!

Chapter 6: Christianity and the Meaning of Life

Chapter 7: Christian Apologists: Why Do They Even Bother?

Chapter 8: Critiques of Three Miscellaneous Christian Topics

Chapter 1: Original Sin: Can’t Live With It; Can’t Live Without It

Preview

Christianity has a big problem with its doctrine of original sin. This problem falls under the rubric of can’t live with it; can’t live without it. I argue that Christianity "can’t live with its doctrine of original sin because the latter is historically, scientifically, and morally implausible. I argue that Christianity can’t live without" its doctrine of original sin because in the course of over two thousand years it has become so insinuated into the vitals of the body of Christian doctrine that removing it at this stage could be fatal to the host.

Creation, Garden of Eden Story, and the Doctrine of Original Sin

The Doctrine of Original Sin is extracted from the larger Genesis creation and garden of Eden story (Gen 1–3), which I will refer to simply as the garden of Eden story. That story describes how God created the world and the primal human pair, Adam and Eve, and placed them in a garden of delights, Eden, filled with pleasing flora and fauna.¹ At this point Adam and Eve were immortal and immune to pain and suffering, as presumably were the fauna in the garden. Though they were invited to enjoy the garden, God commanded them not to eat the fruit of one tree, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, lest they die that very day. Nevertheless, they succumbed to the wiles of a talking snake² and ate from the tree. Most Christians refer to this first human moral transgression as the original sin, which resulted in the fall of man from God’s grace/favor. As punishment, God exiled the pair from the garden and sentenced them to an existence replete with pain, suffering, hardship, and eventual death. Their punishment also included God altering their originally created perfected natures to ones that were now corrupted in a way that rendered them inclined to sin. Moreover, they were rendered unable to rehabilitate or redeem themselves by their own efforts from their fallen state. In addition, God decreed that their fallen status be passed on to all their descendants and shared as well, where applicable, by the members of the animal kingdom.

Can’t Live With the Doctrine of Original Sin

In order to show that Christianity can't live with the Doctrine of Original Sin I’ll show three things.

1.The doctrine of original sin has a serious problem with history and science.

2.The doctrine of original sin has a number of challenging moral problems.

3.The doctrine of original sin has epistemic (that is, knowledge) problems.

Doctrine of Original Sin’s History and Science Problems

As mentioned earlier, the doctrine of original sin is part of the garden of Eden story. If the garden of Eden story is not historically factual, then original sin is not historically factual either. This explains, in part, why fundamentalists, for whom the doctrine of original sin is so integral to many of their other Christian beliefs, such as the incarnation, passion, death, and resurrection of Jesus, are very insistent on affirming the literal truth of the garden of Eden story. They have not been alone in this insistence. For nearly two millennia virtually all major Christian sources, including such luminaries as the apostle Paul and church father Augustine, held that the garden of Eden story describes a literal set of historical events which actually transpired.³ As Bart Klink points out, such sources even include Jesus himself.

In the . . . Bible, Adam is consistently treated as a single historical person. . . . This is why various biblical genealogies trace back to Adam. Genesis

4

–

5

lists Adam's descendants and their ages. The first chapter of

1

Chronicles mentions Adam and his pedigree as a historical person, too. Jesus is considered a descendant of Adam by the author of the Gospel according to Luke. Jesus was about thirty years old when he began his work. He was the son (as was thought) of Joseph son of Heli, . . . son of Enos, son of Seth, son of Adam, son of God. (Luke

3

:

23

–

38

) According to the Gospel of Matthew, even Jesus himself seems to speak about Adam and Eve as historical persons: He answered, ‘Have you not read that the one who made them at the beginning made them male and female.’ (Matt

19

:

4

)⁴

The problem with all the claims of the historical facticity of the garden of Eden story is that the story is clearly inconsistent with numerous important tenets of virtually universally accepted history and science. Among other things, there’s no evidence that the universe or Homo sapiens arose as described in Genesis, or that there was ever a tree the eating of whose fruit would impart a knowledge of good and evil, or that there were ever snakes capable of talking, or that there was ever a time when humans or animals were immortal or incapable of suffering or feeling pain. Not only is there no significant evidence for these elements of the garden of Eden Story, there is a great deal of compelling scientific evidence against these claims. Thus, the history and science regarding the garden of Eden story, and, therefore, also regarding the doctrine of original sin is made implausible by an avalanche of well-attested facts.

Faith-Based Support to the Rescue?

Some Christians have attempted to defend the truth of the garden of Eden story by ultimately appealing to faith rather than historical or scientific evidence. The following excerpt from the organization Catholic Answers on the proper understanding of the fall of man in the garden of Eden story is a good example of this approach.

The story of the creation and fall of man is a true one, even if not written entirely according to modern literary techniques. The Catechism [of the Catholic Church] states, "The account of the fall in Genesis

3

uses figurative language, but affirms a primeval event, a deed that took place at the beginning of the history of man. Revelation gives us the certainty of faith that the whole of human history is marked by the original fault freely committed by our first parents." (Catechism of the Catholic Church,

390

).⁵

The Catechism starts out by claiming the historical facticity of the garden of Eden story in Gen 3. "The account of the fall in Genesis 3 uses figurative language, but affirms a primeval event, a deed that took place at the beginning of the history of man. But then in the next sentence the Catechism’s proposed claim that the deed that took place at the beginning of the history of man is not elucidated or supported by any fact-based evidence. Instead, defense of the garden of Eden Story is given in terms of a faith-based explanation. Revelation gives us the certainty of faith that the whole of human history is marked by the original fault freely committed by our first parents" (emphasis added).

This retreat to a vague faith-based defense of the garden of Eden story obviously does nothing to answer the barrage of scientific and historical facts that are at odds with the biblical description of the original sin event. Thus, I conclude from this first section that the doctrine of original sin is implausible because the story from which it is derived, the garden of Eden story, is scientifically and historically deficient.

Doctrine of Original Sin’s Moral Problems

There are serious moral problems for the doctrine of original sin with respect to the punishment that God is said to have meted out for it. Recall that the punishment included that Adam and Eve, their now more than 117 billion descendants,⁶ and all the animals would thenceforth be subject to pain, suffering, deprivation, and death, often of the most excruciating varieties. (For an approximate numerical estimate of the amount of human and animal suffering over the past five hundred million years, see material in chapter 17 in the section entitled Defense of the Truth of Premise 1). Among the factors indicating that these punishments are morally questionable are the following.

First, it’s not clear that immorality can be justly imputed to Adam and Eve’s actions since the pair apparently lacked a sufficient understanding of morality before they ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. True, they did get one piece of knowledge before eating the fruit, namely, God told them the consequences of such eating. If so, then one might argue that the pair were morally culpable since knowledge of consequences is sufficient under the law to convict.

However, what’s problematic here is that they ate only because they were lied to. They were, in effect, conned by the serpent. Was such gullibility sufficient to charge Adam and Eve with being morally culpable? Consider that they didn’t think to go and ask God first about what the serpent told them. This negligence indicates stupidity rather than guilt. Indeed, what the serpent did to them is literally called entrapment, and is a defense under the law in most penal systems. In fact it’s worse than entrapment because they were deceived into thinking that what they were doing wasn’t even wrong, which is an absolute defense under law. They lacked criminal intent. Imagine a police officer telling someone that speeding was legal, and then they get ticketed by another officer for speeding. They would have a valid defense, as they were deceived into believing they weren’t breaking the law. Perhaps a more direct example would be if someone, unbeknownst to them, swapped speed limit signs on a stretch of road. The entrapment defense for Adam and Eve applies because God had knowledge and intent, given that he is omniscient. He knew that the serpent was going to con them, and didn’t intervene to prevent it or correctly advise the pair. This entailed collusion, a conspiracy (with the serpent) to entrap.

Second, related to the first factor just discussed, a just punishment should have taken as a legitimate mitigating circumstance the fact that the recently created, perhaps childishly innocent, primal pair was no match for the wiles of the talking serpent who, according to Christian tradition, is identified with the devil, that is, Lucifer/Satan. According to that tradition, Lucifer (the shining one) is the most powerful and brilliant creation of God. The fact that Adam and Eve succumbed to such an extraordinarily resourceful and clever tempter should have been a morally relevant extenuating factor, at least in assigning the punishment in their case.

Third, it would be immoral to collectively punish all subsequent human beings (and animals) by giving them corrupted natures, pain, suffering, and death for an action for which they (subsequent human beings) could have had no conceivable responsibility.

Fourth, a life of pain, suffering, deprivation, and death for Adam and Eve as punishment for a simple act of mild disobedience was unjust because it was too severe, not proportionate to the act of disobedience. After all, Adam and Eve were apparently motivated to eat from the tree in large measure by their desire to be like the God they were in awe of and perhaps loved. Their transgression might be said to be analogous to that of an impressionable youngster who disobeys his parents by stuffing himself with Wheaties breakfast cereal so that he could be like the sports hero he idolizes on the front of the cereal box. A moral transgression? Perhaps. But if so, surely a very minor one and understandable in light of the star power of the sports hero and the persuasive power of advertising. The youngster’s transgression was certainly not one that would deserve the death penalty. Analogously, eating the fruit, a moral transgression? Perhaps. But if so, surely a very minor one and understandable in light of the star power of God and the persuasive power of Lucifer. It was certainly not an act that deserved the death penalty.⁷ In effect, no one was harmed by the eating of the fruit, certainly not God, a being so perfect as to be beyond harm. Also, since God is the most perfect being possible, any harms to Adam and Eve (such as, for example, guilt and shame, etc.) could have easily been revoked by God. He could have just erased those harms, like a doctor removing a toxin from the blood acquired by eating poisoned fruit. Consider that, if someone is tricked by a con artist into giving their savings away, it would not be moral to punish the victims with death, or any punishment at all, especially if you could get the money back and restore the victim’s savings and then punish the grifter who stole it. To punish a victim rather than recover them from harm makes no sense, especially when you can easily do the latter. If so, then there would be no moral purpose in punishing the victim. Denis Diderot, a French thinker and critic of religion, wrote mordantly in 1762 in Addition aux Pensées philosphiques, The God of the Christians is a father who is a great deal more concerned about his apples than he is about his children.⁸ Amen.

Evaluation of Three Christian Retorts to the Claim That the Doctrine of Original Sin Has a Moral Problem

Preternatural Gifts Retort to the Claim That the Doctrine of Original Sin Has a Moral Problem

Some Christians have advocated what I call the preternatural (beyond what is normal or natural) gifts retort. According to this retort, Adam and Eve were created with a particular nature to which God added some preternatural properties such as immortality, impassibility (incapacity for suffering), possession of sanctifying grace, and the ability to talk directly with God. After they committed the original sin, God punished them by revoking their preternatural properties, thus leaving them with just a standard human nature. It’s this nature which has been passed on to all their descendants.

According to this preternatural gifts retort there is no divine immorality in any of this.

First, God’s response toward Adam and Eve was not immoral since all it amounted to was the revocation of the gift of preternatural properties to which Adam and Eve had no moral claim in the first place, and certainly not after they disobeyed God.

Second, God did not act immorally toward Adam and Eve’s descendants because they also had no moral claim to the preternatural properties that God had given to Adam and Eve. The following excerpt from The Catholic Encyclopedia expresses the preternatural gifts retort.

But according to Catholic theology man has not lost his natural faculties: by the sin of Adam he has been deprived only of the Divine gifts to which his nature had no strict right, the complete mastery of his passions, exemption from death, sanctifying grace, the vision of God in the next life. The Creator, whose gifts were not due to the human race, had the right to bestow them on such conditions as He wished and to make their conservation depend on the fidelity of the head of the family. A prince can confer a hereditary dignity on condition that the recipient remains loyal, and that, in case of his rebelling, this dignity shall be taken from him and, in consequence, from his descendants. It is not, however, intelligible that the prince, on account of a fault committed by a father, should order the hands and feet of all the descendants of the guilty man to be cut off immediately after their birth. This comparison represents the doctrine of Luther which we in no way defend. The doctrine of the Church supposes no sensible or afflictive punishment in the next world for children who die with nothing but original sin on their souls, but only the privation of the sight of God [Denz., n.

1526

(

1389

)].⁹

Two Asides Concerning the Encyclopedia Excerpt

First aside: the last sentence of the encyclopedia article is notably problematic. It says, "The doctrine of the Church supposes no sensible or afflictive punishment in the next world for children who die with nothing but original sin on their souls, but only the privation of the sight of God (emphasis added). I find the use of the phrase but only the privation of the sight of God to refer to the fate of unbaptized children who die to be troubling. If the sight of God," more commonly referred to as the beatific vision (awareness of, and intimacy with, God in Heaven), is indeed, as Christians claim, the summum bonum (greatest good) for humans, then eternally depriving hundreds of billions of babies who die without being baptized of said highest good of the beatific vision, due to something completely beyond their control, would be extremely unfair—something unworthy of a being who is said to be maximally good and loving. The unbaptized babies did nothing to justify their eternal deprivation of that highest good of the beatific vision in heaven and also did nothing to justify their being eternally separated from their parents, siblings, and other family members who, given Christian theology, may well be in heaven. Furthermore, being aware of such a fate for the baby would likely bring severe consternation to the baby’s parents and other loved ones while they are here on earth or in heaven as well. Yet, on the other hand, if such unbaptized infants were given the beatific vision, then that would be unfair to the many people who were not so privileged to get such an automatic admission into paradise. In sum, multiple serious problems arise if the claim in The Catholic Encyclopedia about the postmortem fate of unbaptized babies were true.

Important Relevant Data about Prenatal Mortality

One might be surprised about the figure of hundreds of billions of babies who die without being baptized that I cited in the previous paragraph. That figure has been confirmed by recent research in reproductive human science. According to Kathryn Kavanagh, associate professor of biology at the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth,

in people, the most common outcome of reproduction by far is embryo loss due to random genetic errors. An estimated

70

% to

75

% of human conceptions fail to survive to birth. That number includes both embryos that are reabsorbed into the parent’s body before anyone knows an egg has been fertilized and miscarriages that happen later in the pregnancy.¹⁰

The article from which the above excerpt is taken is a trove of excellent data about prenatal mortality. What I have done in the following calculations is to use an intermediate figure of 72 percent of conceptions that fail to survive birth. If 72 percent is a reasonable estimate, then, of course 28 percent do survive to be born alive. Demographers estimate that about 117 billion human beings have lived in the three hundred thousand year history of our species.¹¹ If so, then simple math tells us that there have been about 418 billion conceptions (117 billion divided by .28 = 418 billion). Therefore, there have been some 301 billion human persons who were never born (418 – 117 = 301).¹² I bring this to your attention here because it will be used in a number places throughout the rest of the book.

Second aside, recall that The Catholic Encyclopedia states the following.

It is not, however, intelligible that the prince, on account of a fault committed by a father, should order the hands and feet of all the descendants of the guilty man to be cut off immediately after their birth. This comparison represents the doctrine of Luther which we in no way defend.¹³

As I understand it, the encyclopedia is claiming that Luther’s theology in the area of the legacy punishment for original sin is flawed because it’s too harsh. That is, in the prince analogy, Luther’s view would be similar to the Prince ordering the hands and feet of all the descendants of the guilty man to be cut off immediately after their birth. The encyclopedia excerpt implicitly affirms that such an action by the prince would be self-evidently unjust. But a critic of humans’ punishment due to original sin could persuasively note that it would be considerably harsher and, therefore, even more unjust, if the prince were to sentence all the descendants of the guilty man to death accompanied by much suffering beforehand, which is in essentially the penalty for original sin that the encyclopedia is defending.

Responses to the Preternatural Gifts Retort

First response is that God’s punishing humans for original sin and the prince’s punishing his minions for infidelity are, at best, only weakly analogous for the following reasons.

Under certain circumstances when the revocation of a gift would bring about great harm, it’s morally impermissible to revoke it. For example, morally speaking, I can’t demand my donated kidney back even if the recipient were disobedient to me. For a second example, if someone underwrites the expenses for economically poor breastfeeding mothers in order to get them to forego using their own breast milk and instead to feed their babies with formula sold to them at a good profit by the underwriters, then it’s not morally permissible for the underwriter to rescind that gift since doing so would likely have serious life-threatening repercussions for the babies. In the case of God's original sin punishment, it’s obvious that revoking his gifts would be catastrophic not only for the life, limb, and well-being of Adam and Eve, but also for hundreds of billions of their descendants (see chapter 1 section entitled Important Relevant Data about Prenatal Mortality) and for uncountable numbers of sentient animals as well. On the other hand, the prince’s revocation of the title he granted would not result in the kind of universal catastrophic harm that followed God’s punishment for original sin and so should not be thought to be sufficiently analogous to the passed-on punishment for original sin.

Furthermore, there is not only much greater harm that results from God’s rescinding his gifts to Adam and Eve compared to the prince’s revocation of the hereditary title, but the infraction for which God revoked those gifts was much less serious than the infraction that caused the prince to revoke the hereditary title. The prince is likely operating within a system that requires loyalty from those so benefited with a hereditary title, such that the prince’s well-being and that of his principality could be put into significant jeopardy by such breeches of loyalty.