Absurdities of the Bible

A Response to Clarence Darrow’s Article Absurdities of the Bible
by Evan Winslow

I am writing this because I found a link from the Stand to Reason website (Christian apologist Greg Koukl's ministry), which encouraged me to visit some sites with arguments opposing Christianity, so I could get used to hearing arguments from opponents of Christianity. I have done this several times before, but this is my attempt to calmly and logically address some issues without getting noticeably frustrated. The Bible is clear that we need to “let [our] speech always be gracious” as we “answer each person” (Col 4:6). I was confronted with the fact that I fall seriously short in this area just recently, and this is my active attempt to correct that.

Clarence Darrow is an agnostic. As an agnostic, he has found it worthwhile and necessary to explain why he is convinced that Christianity is not a tenable option as a worldview. My “refutation” of his complaints will basically be an attempt not so much to prove him wrong about absurdities in the Bible, but to show that he is not actually an agnostic. Mr. Darrow smuggles in a naturalistic worldview, which is necessarily atheistic. Atheism is not agnosticism. He also smuggles in a theistic worldview. Theism is not agnosticism. How’s that for confusing? Yes you read that right. Mr. Darrow is not agnostic. He is atheistic when it suits him, and agnostic when it suits him, and theistic when it suits him. That’s a bold claim, but one that I think I can substantiate, if you’ll allow me time. I also think that if you pay attention, you’ll be surprised at how many people do this who hold to non-theistic worldviews (I hesitate to say non-Christian because it’s I’m not convinced it’s impossible for other monotheistic religions to be consistent in these areas). For the purposes of my article, atheism will be defined as the positive belief that there is no personal God (as opposed to the lack of belief in a God, which is an admittedly frustrating distinction that it seems more and more atheists are making these days).

Mr. Darrow’s main arguments about the Bible are very common objections to Christianity in general, so I think this will be a good exercise for anyone who might come up against them in a witnessing situation, or if someone just has genuine questions about the Bible. Rather than going through his article line by line, which would not be helpful for learning answers to certain objections, I decided to outline the main objections that he gives. I found seven basic objections in Mr. Darrow’s article, and they are as follows.

The Bible is absurd because…

1) The Bible records impossible events
2) There is no evidence for certain Biblical events
3) There are non-biblical accounts of miracles similar to the Bible’s
4) The people in those days knew next to nothing about science
5) Even some Christians don’t believe the stories are literally true
6) The God of the Bible does immoral things
7) Christians hate knowledge/rationality

I will address these issues one by one in subsequent blogs.