Of Criticism and Higher Criticism

“You believe in a book that has talking animals, wizards, witches, demons, sticks turning into snakes, burning bushes, food falling from the sky, people walking on water, and all sorts of magical, absurd and primitive stories, and you say that we are the ones that need help?” - Mark Twain

“(Mankind) is not likely to salvage civilization unless he can evolve a system of good and evil which is independent of heaven and hell” – George Orwell

My article, What if I don’t want to be saved?, excited many people.

For a writer that is good news as it shows that people do read – contrary to widespread perception. It is also nice to know that what one writes made some people to start to think.

Thinking can only be good for the human brain.

I did not ask for anything more than that human beings (especially Africans) should use their brains to THINK instead of holding tenaciously to dogmas.

The mind, they say, is a terrible thing to waste, human beings should refuse to turn themselves into mindless zombies in the name of a religion.

In writing the article, little did I know that many Africans feel as strongly as I do by the activities of the so-called Christians, with their ignoble lies and the teaching of a fabricated religion constructed entirely on falsehoods.

Many Africans told me that they also feel affronted by the havoc the Christian and other imported religions have wreaked on our continent - the wholesale massacres; the wanton destruction of African cultural patrimony; the forceful imposition of European norms on us; the capture of the African mind and the turning of Africans into unthinking mass of automatons.

Many wrote to give me new information; to them I remain grateful and indebted.

Whereas many Africans wrote to give me kudos for the article, many Christians decided it was time for them to vent their anger and frustrations.

Even though I committed no crime in writing out what I believe to be true, but many of those that go around preaching love, tolerance and forgiveness decided that I have committed capital crime and must be condemned!

A lady from Kenya who called herself Catherine Otieno decided to vigorously masturbate in my inbox with some mind-boggling mindless drivels.

I answered her that I do not possess the mind or the time to waste of her jejune bunkums.

I never would understand these Christians!

Why would an Almighty, Omnipotent and Omniscient god requires ordinary mortals to come to its defence?

Many Christians said that they pray for me so that god will forgive me my sins so that I can be allowed to enter paradise!

Tchaah!

I wrote in my article that I was not interested in any paradise, and that one life is simply enough for; but it looks like our Christians, in their hastes to condemn, refused to digest the gist of my article.

This is sad!

If human beings can evolve a system of justice that refuses to condemn a man for crimes committed by another person, why should the Christian believe the malarkey that their god would roast me because of a sin committee by some Adam and Eve?

Honestly, the Christians are the worst recommendations for their faith. If they live exemplary lives, we can try to emulate them. But few honest people can relate to the mindlessness we see in Christiandom.

I do not care for the company of the Christians that I know to want to be with them in any paradise.

Some of them even asked that I repent, accept Jesus and believe that the Bible is the word of god so that I can be forgiven my sins and be allowed to enter paradise.

What type of bribery is this, and why do people in this age and time believe in this utterly stupid proposition?

So, according to these Christians, Jehovah, in his infinite wisdom will not judge me on the strength of my character; he will not be interested in whether or not I was a good husband, a loving father who never steal and always kept his word. Jehovah will not be interested that I never visited violence on anyone and that I am all for justice.

He will determine my fate solely on my believing that a fiction, some pious priests invented and called his son, and that he wrote a collection of forged, utterly absurd books they called a Bible!

Jehovah will be so angry with me for not believing the stupid tales of the Christian Bible, so much so that he will sentence me to eternal hell-fire, where he will spend eternity roasting me in fire!

Could anything be more preposterous to thinking than this stupid idea?

I know enough chemistry and have been to many cremations to know that it takes all but few minutes of intense fire to reduce a cadaver to ashes; so why would Jehovah be spending eternity roasting poor me?

Why would any god derive any joy in turning itself into a pyromaniac that enjoys the stench of roasting human flesh?

Do the Christians really expect me to cringe in fear?

None of the avowed Christian that wrote questioned the integrity of my article; none queried its accuracy and no one challenged me for peddling falsehood.

Why then are people not interested in the truth?

Why are the Christians afraid to use their brains, do some thinking and arrive at conclusions that accord well with reasoning?

Are they afraid of what they will discover?

Didn’t their Bible plagiarize an Ancient Egyptian injunction: “You will know the truth and the truth will make you free?”

Some of the Christians said that I should accept Jesus and keep referring to him as Jesus Christ as though it were his surname.

The simple fact that two of the gospels, Matthew and Luke, gave two completely different and contradictory accounts of the central figure of their faith, appear not to bother the Christians at all.

That the inspired words of their god should contain so much violence, so much absurdities do not trouble these Christians at all.

According to the Biblical account, Jeshua (Jesus) purportedly lived up to thirty three years of age before he was crucified.

There was no account of him going to any school or learning a trade. He was not reported to have held any job or earn an honest living. Most Christians denied his ever loving his gossiped lover, Mary Magdalene. The Biblical Jesus was painted as a one-dimensional man with no depth. He was as ignorant as the worst of his age. He uttered neither a single intelligent nor an inspiring word. He cursed like a sailor and appeared to be totally ignorant of simple laws of economics as attested to by his reportedly telling his disciples to give unto Caesar what his Caesar - he ignorantly believed that money belongs to those whose portraiture they bear and not to the man that toiled to earn it.

They brought the coin, and he asked them, "Whose portrait is this? And whose inscription?" "Caesar's," they replied. Then he said to them, "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's, and to God what is God's." Matthew 22:21.

Jesus reportedly magically fed people with fish, cast out demons and walked on water.

Jesus believed that diseases were caused by demons; Science proved long time ago that diseases are caused by germs and not by demons.

That is the sum total of the life of the person the Christians called a Saviour!

The story of how the Bible was collected is well document; readers only have to read the accounts of the Nicaean Conferences to know the true origins of the so-called Holy Bible, and discover that the books were chosen by dubious priests inspired only by a desire to make money and grab power.

As to the authenticity of the books of the Bible, if the efforts will not kill the Christians, they should try and compare the Epic of Gilgamesh (available online) with the Biblical fable of Noah.

But seriously, why is using one’s brain to learn new things of less importance than holding tenaciously to a blind dogma?

The mind, they say, is a terrible thing to waste!

Finally, I commend the Christians to Buddha: “Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do not believe in anything simply because it is found written in your religious books. Do not believe in anything merely on the authority of your teachers and elders. Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down for many generations. But after observation and analysis, when you find that anything agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it.”