The question is whether it is morally outrageous to suppose that the innocent victims of such crimes go to heaven.

Actually, the question is whether such crimes don't count as crimes if the victims go to heaven.

Let's further move the debate away from the revenge fantasies of the book of Joshua – because I don't believe the stories there and can't see why I should

The issue is not what you Andrew Brown believe or not believe, the issue is what William Lane Craig believes or not believes

Also there are certain areas of the world where stating that some or all of the book of Joshua is fiction might be deleterious to your continued health and well being

The question is whether it is morally outrageous to suppose that the innocent victims of such crimes go to heaven.

Nope. The question is: does believing that they will go to heaven excuse the crime?

Many of today's problems in the Middle East are the result of the belief of some people in the literal, historical truth of the Old Testament, as a visit to Jerusalem will quickly reveal.

Here's the William Craig Lane quote from the Dawkins article:

So whom does God wrong in commanding the destruction of the Canaanites? Not the Canaanite adults, for they were corrupt and deserving of judgment. Not the children, for they inherit eternal life. So who is wronged?

The question is whether it is morally outrageous to suppose that the innocent victims of such crimes go to heaven.

No, the question Dawkins asked was whether it was morally outrageous to suppose that if the innocent victims of such crimes to go heaven, it makes it morally justifiable (indeed, praiseworthy) to help them get there, by massacring them.

Of course it is.

There are people who claim to take this view, and claim that the problem of evil is a delusion of theism which vanishes if you put theism aside.

It is and it does.

"Evil," is an abstract and relativistic term. It is a description of the immoral value of an act and already you are at the mercy of cultural relavatism and perception.

If I call something "Evil," I am effectively stating that my own morality is superior. I may beat my wife, cheat on my taxes and drive dangerously on a regular basis, but I do not commit murder.

A Nazi could be brainwashed into believing that murdering undesirables is a moral act, but would not condone rape.

For a person to do this is dubious at best; for a religion to do it is nonsense.

Justice, on the other hand, is value neutral. If we assume that all people have an equal right to justice then their own moral stance is irrelevant. I could be a persistent burglar, but if my car is stolen, I have the right to call the Police and report the crime and (hopefully) they do something about it.

Its worth repeating the Lane quote:

Moreover, if we believe, as I do, that God's grace is extended to those who die in infancy or as small children, the death of these children was actually their salvation.

I can't see why they author wants to defend this position, unless he's engaging in ATL trolling.

If you believe there is no God, neither is there any possibility of redemption or setting such things right. All you can say to the victims is "tough luck". That may be the world that we live in.

But I can't see any reason for supposing that it's morally preferable to one where justice is finally done, however incomprehensibly and invisibly to us right now. Such a world may not exist. But to believe in it can't in itself be morally repulsive.

I don't think that last sentence is true. Dawkins' point was not that there's something evil about hoping that injustices can be undone in the afterlife, but that a belief in heaven can be used to justify brutal injustice here on Earth (""Kill them all. Let God sort them out."" etc.).

At that point, a world where people believe in heaven is morally repulsive.

Andrew, you have missed the point or are being disingenous for the sake of generating controversy. Craig was claiming that "going to heaven" excused the killing of innocents - that it made it a "good thing", that a genocidal deity was doing them a favour by having them killed.

If you believe there is no God, neither is there any possibility of redemption or setting such things right. All you can say to the victims is "tough luck". That may be the world that we live in.

Rubbish. That is far from the case. What you say is, we have to do what we can to make sure no-one else has to go through this. We cannot bring back the dead, but we can work to prevent similar things happening to others. That is the only justice we can give them. Anything else is false comfort and fairytales, which do no-one any real good.

Wow. This is all very heavy stuff; premised on a lot of suppositions which has sofar, never been proved. I can see why someone might think it is repulsive to argue that the 'suffering of the innocents will be redeemed by them going to heaven.' For example, for such redemption to take place, the dead innocents would have to become alive again; something which has never been proved to have happened on a large scale. Secondly, there would have to be the existence of 'heaven', which, although some people believe in it, it has never been objectively proven to be anywhere beyound the grave.

If, therefore, we are to accept the proposition that going to 'heaven' will lead to the redemption of the suffering of the innocents, could this not lead to the perpetrators of that suffering being encouraged to inflict more suffering? And how do we know that 'heaven' is indeed a desirable place or state to be in?

Taku2

it cannot be wrong to believe the suffering of innocents will be redeemed by going to heaven

It's wrong because it's untrue. When you're dead, you're dead. It's better to releive people's suffering while they're still alive.

We can't, I think, forgive God or the universe for the horrors of the world that other people suffer.

This is an intriguingly odd sentence. Do you believe God is omnipotent? And omniscient come to that? Is the universe a separate source of authority/value?

If he [God] does exist, he is in some sense responsible, and there is some mechanism, clearly not of this world, by which he can be forgiven.

Why would He need to be forgiven? Why can't it be (as many have held) that it is all part of His ineffable plan? If He fails (let's say) to sort the saints from sinners does that mean His authority is lessened?

Your position (here and above) seems to oddly privilege man's authority in judgement over God. Once you do this, you are left with the rather odd position of making Him answerable to man - a sort democratically accountable god, whose word is law iff he does what he ought.

No wonder you don't get on with the Old Testament...

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But I can't see any reason for supposing that it's morally preferable to one where justice is finally done, however incomprehensibly and invisibly to us right now.

I for one find it morally repulsive that God should presume to know what justice is. It'd be a bit of a Kangaroo court up there, and that's just barbaric.

If you believe there is no God, neither is there any possibility of redemption or setting such things right. All you can say to the victims is "tough luck". That may be the world that we live in.

No, you try and capture those who did it, and put them on trial. Then you work to make sure it doesn't happen again.

Mmmm - isn't the problem not what God does - after all even the most revolting end could be seen as not too bad if followed by an eternity of bliss -- but what sort of monsters the Israelites must necessarily become as a nation, as they hack their way through ranks of non-combatants.

The horror is not just that it happened, but that there's no-one in this setup to say 'that was utterly wrong and must never happen again'.

I suspect Dawkins thinks he was being clever by taking Lane Craig's theology literally - instead he's muddied the waters so that Craig could represent him as a coward - he should just simply have said 'I've spoken to you once already, it's simply not worth my time to do so again.'

Dawkins is a real scammer on this issue.

Dawkins actually knew of William Laine Craig's views on the Caananites way back in 2008 and put them in print, Private Eye caught him on that one in their 50th Anniversary Issue

Naughty naughty!

If you believe there is no God, neither is there any possibility of redemption or setting such things right. All you can say to the victims is "tough luck".

Nonsense. We can seek to build a world - in this world, not the next - where such things don't happen. These are not insoluble problems. If all you can say to victims & their families is that they'll find some kind of unquantifiable redemption in a time & place that doesn't exist, only if they believe in a mystic entity that doesn't exist - that's quite repulsive...

I'm going to ignore the main thrust of the article, which is a defence of something Craig didn't say, ignoring what he did say.

Instead, I'll take issue with these rather naive statements:

If you believe there is no God, neither is there any possibility of redemption or setting such things right. All you can say to the victims is "tough luck". That may be the world that we live in.

The concept of heaven is, IMHO, born of the need of the powerful to persuade the downtrodden that this isn't their only shot at life, that it's OK toiling for your whole life as a serf on your master's estates, because the meek shall inherit the earth. It's the ultimate bogus payment protection insurance. Life is just crap for many, and religion is the ruling class' way of preventing the poor from rising up.

Let's just give WLC a chance to submit his own article. I don't expect it to be any good, as I don't think his other arguments are any good, but since he's been built up into such a major figure in CiFLand now it would be better to let both the Dawkins crowd and the creationists have a chance to actually read him defend himself.

What bothers me most in this is that CiF regularly gives platforms to people who think Lenin was a jolly good thing and if he broke a few eggs that's justified by the absolutely scrumptious omelette that would have eventuated if things had gone according to plan. In fact some of these people are on a retainer from the Guardian to churn out their stuff. If that's acceptable, then nothing WLC has ever written could put him beyond the pale. If anything, his version of transcendental blamelessness may make marginally more sense.

I believe the idea of the suffering of innocents, or the general idea of suffering having a redemptive nature, purpose, meaning, whatever, is a manifestation of Freud's Death Drive.

A source of agonistic pleasure.

I also believe the flip side of the coin is sadism.

I think why Dawkins is so bruised by his experience of religion, is he may have experienced a little religious sadism as a child.

Religious sadism would be something like a nun, in an orphanage, torment and torturing children, as a means to redeem them - they're doing the work of the lord, punishing these children for the sins of their parents. So, they're literally killing two birds with one stone.

And you can stretch it to the concentration camp guard - who is cruel to the prisoners and eventually helps kill them. People are cruel, not because it feels bad for them, but becuase it feels good. The guard will feel their redeeming themselves and their prisoners, through their sadism.

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I really don't understand why Professor Dawkins can't just say "I'm not going to debate Mr Craig because I don't like him or respect him" and leave it at that.

No one has a right to demand anyone else publically debate with them. Dawkins has published books by which he can be judged.

We can't, I think, forgive God or the universe for the horrors of the world that other people suffer.

Isn't that blasphemy? Only God can forgive someone of their sins. Yes, we also can forgive other people, but it means nothing compared to God's forgiveness.

I thought that Jesus, as our saviour, suffered and died so that we would not have to.
Obviously my exegesis is wrong.

No, you try and capture those who did it, and put them on trial. Then you work to make sure it doesn't happen again.

Precisely. The non-existence of 'heavenly justice' makes the real thing absolutely vital. I don't think Andrew understands what Charlie meant re: "The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people" being "the demand for their real happiness", or the importance of real pie for the poor and hungry, as opposed to "pie in the sky", in Joe's amusing but highly pertinent song. Fantasies about justice and food beyond the grave are ineffectual and actively pernicious in encouraging people to passively accept injustice and poverty in their real lives: it's that mindset that tells people "tough luck", because "it'll be better when you're dead". Dispense with the consoling fantasies, and you can address the real-world injustices.

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davidabsalom

Here's the William Craig Lane quote from the Dawkins article:

So whom does God wrong in commanding the destruction of the Canaanites? Not the Canaanite adults, for they were corrupt and deserving of judgment. Not the children, for they inherit eternal life. So who is wronged?

There is something very unnerving about anyone who would deem an entire people as wicked or corrupt and use that to justify or excuse their murder. It makes no difference if the murderer is a god or a man, this line of reasoning can only be the product of an unhinged mind.

Richard Dawkins is wrong to call William Lane Craig morally repulsive

Well Andrew, when you have read some of these btl comments - possibly you will change your mind.

WLC is quoted as saying

So who is wronged? Ironically, I think the most difficult part of this whole debate is the apparent wrong done to the Israeli [sic] soldiers themselves. Can you imagine what it would be like to have to break into some house and kill a terrified woman and her children? The brutalising effect on these Israeli [sic] soldiers is disturbing."

that is morally repugnant, can you imagine if these words were written about Operation Cast Lead for instance.

Dawkins is correct - this Craig guy is deluded, and you do yourself no favours by defending his position

The concept of heaven is, IMHO, born of the need of the powerful to persuade the downtrodden that this isn't their only shot at life, that it's OK toiling for your whole life as a serf on your master's estates, because the meek shall inherit the earth. It's the ultimate bogus payment protection insurance. Life is just crap for many, and religion is the ruling class' way of preventing the poor from rising up.

Indeed. "Pie in the sky when you die", to quote a man who ended up being executed unjustly after a short life of poverty and TB. No heavenly fantasies can put that right, or give us the unwritten songs. All we can do is try to make the world a better place through our own lives.

I thought that Jesus, as our saviour, suffered and died so that we would not have to.
Obviously my exegesis is wrong.

Correct

Sam Harris has recently called William lane Craig a debater his fellow atheists "most fear "- which is why Richard Dawkins bunked off the interview.

But also Harris is fascinated by the problem of consciousness and spirituality and seems to be getting to some kind of "truce" between science and spirituality. He seems as confused as all of us on these subjects, see The Mystery of Consciousness.

You truly live in a bizarre mental space Andrew.

two things... The first is whether God commands genocide. The second is whether he is able to take innocents to heaven.

The problem with this is that 'God' and 'heaven' are abstractions - mental conceptions which have no existence outside of human minds. They have simply no other connection to the real world. There are no data which would allow one even to begin to define their properties as real objects. I can invent exactly equipotent concepts: let me name them 'wrarkle' and 'mugton'. Replacing your meaningless labels with mine gives "The first is whether wrarkle commands genocide. The second is whether he is able to take innocents to mugton." The information content of the text is neither increased nor decreased thereby.

Imagine a German mother in East Prussia in 1945, with an eight-year-old daughter. The Red Army arrives. They rape the daughter, in front of her, until she is dead. Then they do the same to the mother. Such things happened, and they happen still in the world today. [This is followed by a further shell game with meaningless abstractions.]

Surely one does not need a doctorate in theology to recognize that this is a bad thing to happen. And surely the only useful conclusion is that we ought to so arrange society that the chances of similar bad things happening in the future are minimized. Expression of views which attempt to discount the badness of being raped by Russian soldiers (or any similar personal agony), on any grounds, but perhaps most odiously of all on grounds based on theological fantasy (forgive the oxymoron), run directly counter to this aim. Dawkins was right to express detestation of them.

So, they're literally killing two birds with one stone.

What birds?

Religion will always be the opiate of the people.

The question is whether it is morally outrageous to suppose that the innocent victims of such crimes go to heaven.

It's more the attitude of 'screw trying to help out, they'll live forever anyway' which annoys me. It's all very well constructing these naive fantasies but it isn't worth a hill of beans unless these disasters and crimes are opposed in the here and now where we can see them.

oxymoron

Arrrrgh I mean tautology. I always get those mixed up.

What the byline said:

Whatever Lane Craig's failings, it cannot be wrong to believe the suffering of innocents will be redeemed by going to heaven

What the byline omitted:

and that it is therefore morally defensible to kill them, as described in the Bible.

AndrewBrown

If you believe there is no God, neither is there any possibility of redemption or setting such things right. All you can say to the victims is "tough luck". That may be the world that we live in.

If you haven't read it yet, I'd highly recommend to you Surprised By Hope by Tom Wright.

He explores the idea (explored elsewhere in some of his more 'meaty' books) of a soteriology that is more universal in scope than the personal soteriology stressed in some 'americanised' versions of christianity.

Christian Apologetics: about as much fun as having root-canal work with no anaesthetic.

"The first is whether God commands genocide"

Not only commands it, but actually commits it, on several occasions. Read the Old Testiment, unless you choose to selectively disbelieve the bits that make you uncomfortable.

"Or it is eventually understood – and accepted – by them as meaningful, and so redeemed. It seems obvious that the second of these two possibilities would be better"

Its this thinking that sustained the feudal system in Europe for 10 centuries, yes its fine for Kings and Bishops to live in great palaces and eat the finest meats, while the peasantry dwell in huts and eat (literally) shit tainted vegetable mass, as God put each person where they are, and, if you poor just knuckle down and take it then your reward awaits in heaven, if not its hell for eternity and we have armed knights and trained inquisitors to speed you on your way.

"But I can't see any reason for supposing that it's morally preferable to one where justice is finally done, however incomprehensibly and invisibly to us right now. Such a world may not exist. But to believe in it can't in itself be morally repulsive."

It depends, surely it is more repulsive if the belief in justice in the next world actually leads to injustice in this, and those in power using God's will to justify it.
I am not familiar with the story of the Canaanites, but the slaughter of both Cathars and Catholics alike, as they happened to be living in the same towns, on the grounds that "God will know his own" must surely be such a case?

The question is whether it is morally outrageous to suppose that the innocent victims of such crimes go to heaven.

The question is wheter Andrew Brown is deliberately trying to create controversy, or is genuinely so obtuse to think that's the question. As many people already pointed out, what would be morally outrageus is justifying those crimes because the victims would "go to heaven".

He explores the idea (explored elsewhere in some of his more 'meaty' books) of a soteriology that is more universal in scope than the personal soteriology stressed in some 'americanised' versions of christianity.

Isn't there this thing called "the Catholic church" that already teaches something like that?

Sam Harris has recently called William lane Craig a debater his fellow atheists "most fear "- which is why Richard Dawkins bunked off the interview.

Dawkins has pretty much always refused to debate with creationists and Craig has some particularly dodgy views on genocide. So how do you assert so confidently that Dawkins has some secret motivation for refusing to debate?

Fantasies about justice and food beyond the grave are ineffectual and actively pernicious in encouraging people to passively accept injustice and poverty in their real lives: it's that mindset that tells people "tough luck", because "it'll be better when you're dead". Dispense with the consoling fantasies, and you can address the real-world injustices.

If you think this is what a belief in heaven encourages then I believe you are mistaken. In both the NT and OT injustice is condemned and actions to relieve poverty actively encouraged in the here and now.

As an example in Amos the injustices of the rich in Israel are condemned.

“For three sins of Israel,
even for four, I will not relent.
They sell the innocent for silver,
and the needy for a pair of sandals.
7 They trample on the heads of the poor
as on the dust of the ground
and deny justice to the oppressed.

And consequences for this are:

13 “Now then, I will crush you
as a cart crushes when loaded with grain.
14 The swift will not escape,
the strong will not muster their strength,

The sooner theologians admit they are wrong the sooner we can get on with sorting out real life problems.

Here's the quote from Craig's own website, with some added context:

By setting such strong, harsh dichotomies God taught Israel that any assimilation to pagan idolatry is intolerable. It was His way of preserving Israel’s spiritual health and posterity. God knew that if these Canaanite children were allowed to live, they would spell the undoing of Israel. The killing of the Canaanite children not only served to prevent assimilation to Canaanite identity but also served as a shattering, tangible illustration of Israel’s being set exclusively apart for God.

Moreover, if we believe, as I do, that God’s grace is extended to those who die in infancy or as small children, the death of these children was actually their salvation. We are so wedded to an earthly, naturalistic perspective that we forget that those who die are happy to quit this earth for heaven’s incomparable joy. Therefore, God does these children no wrong in taking their lives.

So whom does God wrong in commanding the destruction of the Canaanites? Not the Canaanite adults, for they were corrupt and deserving of judgement. Not the children, for they inherit eternal life. So who is wronged? Ironically, I think the most difficult part of this whole debate is the apparent wrong done to the Israeli soldiers themselves. Can you imagine what it would be like to have to break into some house and kill a terrified woman and her children? The brutalizing effect on these Israeli soldiers is disturbing.

I have not changed, added or removed anything. (Nor, as far as I can see, did Dawkins.) No cherry-picking (you know what that is, don't you Andrew?) - if anything, the more you quote from WLC the worse (the more morally repulsive if you like) he looks.

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Heresiarch
9 November 2011 11:42AM

The question is whether it is morally outrageous to suppose that the innocent victims of such crimes go to heaven.

No, the question Dawkins asked was whether it was morally outrageous to suppose that if the innocent victims of such crimes to go heaven, it makes it morally justifiable (indeed, praiseworthy) to help them get there, by massacring them.

Of course it is.

It is if you ignore the 10 commandments, This life is a trial and we have freedom of will, but we also know, if we believe, how God wants us to behave. It doesnt involve massacring the innocentt, whatever the motive. This level of argument is rather silly. You either believe and understand the logic, or you dont believe. If you dont, why does the logic matter to you? In fact if you dont believe, your moral compass is even more awry, as it's totally subjective.

Richard Dawkins determines his own morality as do all of us. If Richard Dawkins finds WLC morally repugnant he has the right to say so. Whether anyone else agrees is irrelevant.

If genocide is excused on the basis of theology later shown to be incorrect are the excusers guilty?