Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Clivedurdle · 11-30-2007, 05:35 AM

What is it with humans and holy books?

What happened that reading the alleged word of god is thought to give answers to life the universe and everything?

When was this idea invented, where? Why has it survived?

Why did the written word become holy?

Jesus W. Vader · 11-30-2007, 08:37 AM

That is a very good question. My shot in the dark is that it's at least partly about social cohesion among a group of believers having the saem language. Also, the written word cannot be quite as easily altered as people simply receiving personal messages from God-which is why charismatics are not well liked by other fundies.

Toto · 11-30-2007, 08:39 AM

I blame Martin Luther.

Written and Spoken Word

Quote:

Luther says in the Smalcald Articles: "We ought and must constantly maintain that God does not wish to deal with us otherwise than through the spoken word and the sacraments, and that whatever without the word and sacraments is extolled as spirit is the devil himself."1 In the article on the Gospel he says that the first and basic form of the Gospel application is "the spoken word by which the forgiveness of sins is preached in the whole world, which is the peculiar office of the Gospel."

. . .

Luther strongly emphasizes the authority of the written word of God. He says again and again that it is God's word and as such the highest norm and standard of our faith and life. All human doctrines, which are not in harmony with the Scriptures, must be rejected. He set Scripture against the doctrines of the Roman Church, requiring that Church to reconcile its doctrines with the word of God. "We request the papists that they first reconcile their doctrines with the Scriptures. If they accomplish that, we will observe their doctrines.... We censure the doctrines of men, not because they are spoken by men, but because they are lies and blasphemies against the Scriptures. And the Scriptures, although they also were written by men, are not of men nor from men, but from God. Now since Scriptures and the doctrines of men are contrary the one to the other, one must lie and the other be true."

Clivedurdle · 11-30-2007, 08:46 AM

But is it not a much much older idea than Luther? Moses and the tablets of Stone?

Jesus as the word?

Sven · 11-30-2007, 08:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

I blame Martin Luther.

AFAIK, the Koran is also considered to be "holy". It's would be somewhat strange if Muslims only started to look at it this way after Luther, don't you think?

Clivedurdle · 11-30-2007, 09:22 AM

Is it a result of one of Arthur Clarkes laws about inventions appearing magical?

Reading and writing and carving on stone are pretty impressive technologies that would be seen as gifts of the gods and those with the power to read and write would obviously be in touch with the gods?

Quote:

formulated the following three "laws" of prediction:

1. When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.
2. The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.
3. Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

Clarke's_three_laws

Has anyone looked for correlations between the invention of reading and writing and religious systems?

Might the great religions be a product of the invention of reading and writing?

Baalazel · 11-30-2007, 08:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clivedurdle

Is it a result of one of Arthur Clarkes laws about inventions appearing magical?

Reading and writing and carving on stone are pretty impressive technologies that would be seen as gifts of the gods and those with the power to read and write would obviously be in touch with the gods?

Quote:

formulated the following three "laws" of prediction:

1. When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.
2. The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.
3. Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarke's_three_laws

Has anyone looked for correlations between the invention of reading and writing and religious systems?

Might the great religions be a product of the invention of reading and writing?

We could point out Clive that the Hebrews where denied by their God any art form other than the written word and so what has come down to us from them is their history as a religious people. This history was used then by the members of the early Christian church to validate the life of Jesus.

Had their God not commanded the Jews to reject representational art forms the Bible would have come down to us in a much different form. Indeed it may not have come down to us at all. It interests me to think of the art the Jews would have given us were it not for this restriction.

Baal

youngalexander · 12-01-2007, 12:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clivedurdle

Has anyone looked for correlations between the invention of reading and writing and religious systems?

Prehistoric Religion

There are no extant textual sources from the Neolithic era, the most recent available dating from the Bronze Age, and therefore all statements about any belief systems Neolithic societies may have entertained are glimpsed from archaeology.

Of course, this may be OT, or even OF!
So,

Quote:

Might the great religions be a product of the invention of reading and writing?

google apparently not, since some, eg. aboriginal are not literate.
How about major religions?

Joan of Bark · 12-01-2007, 03:46 AM

Things in hardcopy just get more respect than stuff that's oral. This has probably been true since the first artist reproduced a gazelle (or whatever animal was around at that time) on the wall of a cave.

And of course, the older the writing the more respectful it seems ... as if surviving the Great Editor Father Time is a sign of legitimacy.

douglas · 12-01-2007, 08:10 AM

Bart Ehrman has a nice explanation of the roots of Abrahamaic religions' "bookishness." There's an excerpt on npr.org.

Here's a snip...

Quote:

For modern people intimately familiar with any of the major contemporary Western religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam), it may be hard to imagine, but books played virtually no role in the polytheistic religions of the ancient Western world. These religions were almost exclusively concerned with honoring the gods through ritual acts of sacrifice. There were no doctrines to be learned, as explained in books, and almost no ethical principles to be followed, as laid out in books. This is not to say that adherents of the various polytheistic religions had no beliefs about their gods or that they had no ethics, but beliefs and ethics -- strange as this sounds to modern ears -- played almost no role in religion per se. These were instead matters of personal philosophy, and philosophies, of course, could be bookish. Since ancient religions themselves did not require any particular sets of "right doctrines" or, for the most part, "ethical codes," books played almost no role in them.

Judaism was unique in that it stressed its ancestral traditions, customs, and laws, and maintained that these had been recorded in sacred books, which had the status, therefore, of "scripture" for the Jewish people.

11-30-2007, 05:35 AM	#1
Clivedurdle Contributor Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: London UK Posts: 16,024	Book fetishism What is it with humans and holy books? What happened that reading the alleged word of god is thought to give answers to life the universe and everything? When was this idea invented, where? Why has it survived? Why did the written word become holy?

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11-30-2007, 08:37 AM	#2
Jesus W. Vader Regular Member Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Dick and George's Bogus Brave New World Posts: 347	That is a very good question. My shot in the dark is that it's at least partly about social cohesion among a group of believers having the saem language. Also, the written word cannot be quite as easily altered as people simply receiving personal messages from God-which is why charismatics are not well liked by other fundies.

11-30-2007, 08:46 AM	#4
Clivedurdle Contributor Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: London UK Posts: 16,024	But is it not a much much older idea than Luther? Moses and the tablets of Stone? Jesus as the word?

12-01-2007, 03:46 AM	#9
Joan of Bark Veteran Member Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Pua, in northern Thailand Posts: 2,823	Things in hardcopy just get more respect than stuff that's oral. This has probably been true since the first artist reproduced a gazelle (or whatever animal was around at that time) on the wall of a cave. And of course, the older the writing the more respectful it seems ... as if surviving the Great Editor Father Time is a sign of legitimacy.

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