Recently I have been looking into several contradictions I
believe I have found in Christianity.
As a Philosopher, I have accepted to challenge to seek to
define and prove this contradiction.
Furthermore, I seek your council to confirmation if my
thinking is valid.
Over the years, I have considered myself a Christian and
followed in its practices. This includes going to church, praying, and reading
the bible. It can be reasoned that a person adopts a faith for one or more of
the following reasons:
1)
Promise of life after death
2)
Redemption for past wrong doings
3)
Explanation for unanswered questions
4)
Guidance in how to approach life
5)
Promise for peace in this life (i.e. the
conscious life lived in the material world)
Though it can be admitted that more reasons may exist, these
are the primary reasons I feel necessary to state for this argument. One by one
I would like to disprove each approach and present the found contradiction.
In reverse order, the 5th reason is disproved by
the bible itself, as it states that “a person living a life for Christ WILL
face suffering and WILL have to bear their cross every day for their faith.”
The fourth approach is invalid as the faith itself stands on
feeble ground. Though many Christian practices can be admired, the philosophy
of Christianity as a whole does not have a stable foundation.
Although Genesis presents an argument as to how the world
was created, philosophers such as Hume would argue that such claims are logical
fallacies, and thus are not valid explanations.
Redemption is technically a state of mind, as one must find
fault with themselves and hold themselves accountable. It is then up to the
subject to find forgiveness. However, a person must primarily find forgiveness
for themselves and for the affected party/parties, if any exists. If we believe
that God is an artificial manifestation of the mind, then the forgiveness is
also an artificial manifestation, having no actual value in the grand scheme of
things.
Finally is the promise after death, which is where the
contradiction lies.
There are two approaches that I have found to this goal:
A) The
As you are
B) The
As you never will be
The “As you are” approach states that God has an
unimaginable love for human beings, and has sacrificed his son for the complete
forgiveness of all of our sins. As such, the only requirement for one to get
into heaven is to accept that this event is true, that God is real and Jesus
was sacrificed for our sins. We must also believe that Jesus is the son of God.
This has 2 problems:
1) God
is the ultimate writer of all of the world’s laws. Therefore, he can state
whether or not there is a cost for sin. If he states that there is, then it is
up to us to pay it. However, by sacrificing His son, He is paying OUR debt.
Thusly we are not in debt for our sins, but instead in debt for the sacrifice
that He committed. In this case, we are indebted to God and must pay with our
own lives. In theory, this can be thought of as greater challenge or an
impossible one. It is greater if OUR sacrifices and deeds as humans can atone
for our sins. It is impossible if our actions cannot atone for our sins. If our
actions cannot atone for our sins, then we can never make the proper sacrifice to
equal Jesus’s sacrifice. This leads into the “As you never will be” approach.
2) If
Jesus’s sacrifice is the ultimate sacrifice, and our actions cannot make up for
our sins, then we are already forgiven for our sins and are already accepted.
As such, we are guaranteed a place in heaven as long as we believe, and nothing
we can do in life can change that. As such, we can sin as much as we want and
we will always be forgiven as long as we believe. This theory can be countered
with the idea of reliance. If we constantly devote ourselves to God, praying,
going to church, and so on, we keep God in our mind, and thusly remember to
believe in him. If we abstain from such processes we will begin to depend on
ourselves and forget God and Paradise. However, If a person remembers God past
all there sin, they would still be guaranteed a place in heaven, contradicting
the idea that it is up to us as humans to abstain from sin, since this policy
believes there is no penalty for sinning if our faith remains constant.
The next argument is the “As you will never be.” It can be
believed that only Christians can be allowed into heaven, for a person being
allowed into heaven who isn’t a Christian would be illogical. However, the
bible states that a person is not considered a Christian unless that are wholly
committed to God. This requires them to put God ahead of all other facets of
life, including family, occupation, aspirations, and everything else that a
person can identify with. As such, their entire palette is swapped from that of
a human to that of Jesus. However, the bible also reveals that this is
impossible, as no human being can achieve perfect faith. The only people who
can claim to have done so are Jesus himself and Job. Jesus can be acquitted as
he is the Son of God and may have some divine potential to remain in faith. Job
as such is the only true human to have remained faithful no matter what. This
presents the idea that only one person to our knowledge has lived a fully
devoted life. Other biblical figures, such as Paul, Peter, Solomon, and so on,
are shown to fall short of the goal that God has put forth for them. As such,
if these grand figures of faith could not attain the level of devotion required
of us, how can we? By this argument, there is little to no chance a person can
reach the goal God has set for us, then any effort to do so would be futile.
As such, It can be stated that if either approach is true,
then sinful action or righteous action has no effect other than straying our
attention from God. Therefore, the only way to get into heaven is if:
A) Sin
has no cost against us since all sins are forgiven
B) We
believe in God’s existence and Jesus’s act and identity
If this is true, then a person does not need to evangelize,
pray, go to church, and so on, as long as they maintain faith.
This is the primary contradiction: The bible does not
clearly state which of these approaches is correct.
There are two other contradictions, one simple, one not so
simple.
The Second contradiction is the role of Judas. It can be agreed
that Judas “betrayed” Jesus so that he would be sentenced to death. Based on my
knowledge, I believe this betrayal was Judas standing as a witness to Jesus
committing an illegal act so that he would be condemned to death. However, HOW
Judas isn’t important, simply that fact that he caused Jesus to die.
Now, the motivation for Judas betraying Jesus must be called
into question. It is stated in the Bible that “it was at that point that the
devil entered Judas, and he was persuaded to betray Jesus.”
This can be interpreted in two ways:
A) Judas
made the sinful decision to betray Jesus for personal reasons
B) Satan
possessed Judas to commit the act of betraying Jesus against his will.
If B is true, then Judas cannot be held accountable for his
actions since it was not HE who chose to commit, but Satan who overpowered him.
If A is correct, then it was Judas’s decision, and he is to held accountable.
If either is true, then the act of Judas betraying Jesus was
actually one of the most holy acts in history.
Here is why:
Before Jesus was physically born, it was prophesized that a
savior would come, live, and be sacrificed for the complete forgiveness of all
sins. It is the sacrifice that caused the forgiveness. Jesus said in the Garden
of Olives and to his disciples that He HAD to die, that what came to pass MUST
happen. If Jesus never died, he would have never achieved what he was placed on
this earth to achieve, and much of the Christian message would be null and
void. Forgiveness cannot exist without the sacrifice, and the sacrifice could
not have happened without the betrayal. As such, Judas is the conjoining point
that connects the birth of Jesus to the death of Jesus. As such, he committed a
holy act.
To further promote this irony, we can examine the
consequence. Judas, ridden with guilt, kills himself. He dies because he
realized what he did. If we connect this to Dante’s Inferno, then we see Judas
later fall under the ultimate punishment, being chewed eternally by Satan in
the lowest circle of hell. However, if we look at Judas’s act as a holy act,
this would make him a martyr, dying for the holy act he committed. If we take
the stance that Satan possessed Judas’s body, and it was Satan through Judas
that betrayed Jesus, then it was Satan who committed the holy act, making Satan
the holy martyr in the scenario. Truly ironic to think of the ultimate evil to
be accountable for the forgiveness of all sins.
As such the second contradiction is: Judas/ Satan committed
and evil act, even though they completed the circle and led to the complete
forgiveness of all sins.
The third contradiction deals with the topic of authenticity
Now, one minor contradiction is the Bible’s claim that “all
of God’s disciples must become like children.” To be a child, one must have
unquestionable faith, like a child’s faith in their parent. Even though they
have no solid foundation that their parent will come through for them, they
still believe in their parent. This faith must be held in ignorance. We must
not question why God makes a decision, we must simply accept that He made that
decision and that He has a reason for doing so.
However, the bible also promotes us to study the bible and
learn the message of God. By studying the Bible, we learn the motivation of
God, and the mind of God, and the messages of God, and as such cannot hope to
live in ignorance since we are pursuing knowledge and reason. The idea that we
are supposed to study the word and still remain ignorantly loyal is a fallacy,
as reason increases questionability, we require greater explanation as to why
we believe.
However, the authenticity goes further than this faith.
Authenticity is the questioning of the motivation to sin, and the validity of
the sinner’s redemption.
The bible states that if a person sins, they have done
wrong. If they ask for forgiveness, they are forgiven. The problem already is
that this proposes that sin has a penalty, which was disproven by our previous
theory. However, if we are to follow along the same tangent that sin does have
cost, we can believe this first statement to be valid.
The Bible then states that a person is forgiven for their
sin, but is only truly forgiven if they “repent,” which means that a person
A)
Does not commit the sin again
B)
Strives to prevent themselves from committing
the sin
C)
Works to move in the opposite direction of sin
In this frame of mind, we can take the sin of aggression,
and imagine a man who commits violent acts against people. True repentance
could be seen if he:
A)
Doesn’t hurt anyone ever again
B)
Gets rid of all weapons in his house, and
removes himself from environments that would make him aggressive
C)
Seeks counseling for aggressive tendencies,
works to interact with people peacefully
However, the Bible does state that it is impossible for a
person to live without sin. This could be interpreted as “You will eventually
commit sin once, but are then expected to never sin again,” but we have shown
before that the goal of living a life as a true Christian is near impossible.
Continuing with this same train of thought, we can reason
that a person cannot seek redemption until they have ceased sinning. If a
person commits a sin, prays for forgiveness, then sins again, then they never
began the path of repentance. As such, a person is charged to live sinlessly
before they are forgiven. If they begin the path, then turn, the forgiveness
would be withdrawn. Thus, forgiveness of sin is not freely given, as a person
must extinguish the sin from their life.
Thusly, the third contradiction is: A person is not forgiven
outright, they must repent of their sin, which is a difficult task
In sum, we have three contradictions:
First – The Bible does not give a clear approach as to how a
person gets into heaven, even though it claims to. The only valid approach
still bears contradictions in terms of the weight of sin.
Second – Judas/Satan committed an evil act and deserved to
be punished, even though the act was actually a holy one that made forgiveness
possible
Third – Forgiveness is not freely given. It is earned
through repentance, which is difficult, and puts a penalty on sin. This would
contradict the only valid stance on getting into heaven, as this contradiction
could claim that there is a consequence to sin, even though the valid stance
says there isn’t.
These are the contradictions I believe I have found in
Christianity. If these are true, then many of the claims of the Bible would be
invalid.
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