A recent survey has confirmed what is already well-known: that Americans are a hopelessly religious lot, given to infantile delusions about their place in the cosmos and a penchant for believing the utterly implausible.
The poll found that 78% of Americans believe that not only did Jesus exist, but that he rose from the dead, a feat that was most notably replicated by the estimable Dr. Frankenstein. Like the barely literate ignoramuses who assembled the tall tale of Jesus, Dr. Frankenstein created his monster from an assortment of discarded parts, which, by their individual selves, were hardly remarkable in any sense. But with a few serendipitous tweaks and revisions, the good doctor struck the perfect combination and brought his beast to life.
So it went with the gospels, a collection of third, fourth, and one hundredth-hand hearsays about the alleged miracles of Jesus. Realistically, if he existed at all Jesus of Nazareth was most likely little more than an eccentric preacher, and thus by definition a charlatan. The gospels were written at different intervals, but all were penned at least fifty years after the death of Christ, which is plenty of time for the notable peculiarities of one man to morph into a fantastic story about the savior of humanity; and more than enough time for the countless clueless of antiquity to warm up to it.
A short meditation on this score: Most of us have played some version of “telephone” as children, whereby one child starts by whispering a statement to another, and that child whispers it to another, and so on and so forth. When the last child receives the news, she is to repeat aloud what she has just been told for all to hear. Very often the final statement is so bowdlerized, so misinterpreted and tinkered with, that it hardly resembles the opening remark if at all. Quite naturally, the likelihood of a sentence becoming lost in translation increases when there are more players. Now imagine a game of telephone that starts not with a statement, but a vague anecdote. Imagine also thousands of players, most of them illiterate and gullible. And suppose the game takes place not over a few minutes or over the course of an afternoon, but instead for more than a half-century. I should hope we do not need the informed opinion of a child to surmise that the fruits of this grapevine would be very rotten indeed.
The lack of contemporary extrabiblical sources accounting for Jesus does not bode well for this already extraordinary tale’s veracity. Indeed, the evidence on which Christians base their faith is put to shame by the available data speaking to the existence of the elusive chupacabra. Nonetheless, that hardly prevents 81% of Americans from believing that Jesus was sent earthward by god to serve as a child sacrifice so that humans could be absolved of their inherently wicked ways.
Naturally, these statistics are reported in earnest by the reputable media, no members of which deign to remark on the absurdity of the figures. Of course, with more than four-fifths of the general population having bought this sordid story of vicarious redemption, believers are going to be everywhere, including the media. But it is the political ramifications of this idiocy that produces the worst kind of mischief.
Article VI of our Constitution states, “[N]o religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.” Yet such examinations are given all the time, informally, by the virtuous and faithful populace which demands that the metaphysical beliefs of public officials do not stray too far from what the collective wisdom deems “normal.” That is to say, Christian. Failing that, a belief in a god of some kind is necessary. One survey indicated that Americans are less likely to vote for an atheist than a Muslim candidate, which is puzzling for this observer since he cannot recall any atheistic terrorists waging jihad against the United States.
But mere belief in the proper deity does not always suffice to convince the masses of one’s virtue. It is often necessary to persecute some group or vice in order to demonstrate an adequate level of religious commitment. No longer is it considered appropriate in America to target Jews, or Mormons, or even Muslims. Thus xenophobia, a constant presence in American society from the moment the Europeans arrived, manifests itself in other ways more acceptable to so-called good society. Atheists are always a reliable whipping post, because while it is inappropriate to attack a man because of his religion, it is only right and godly to scold him for his lack of one.
- Max
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