Religulaugh? (Short Non-Exhaustive Review)

Yosemite Valley, California (trekearth)


Yosemite Park, California (trekearth)

Religulous

Wikipedia link above.

Religulous is a 2008 US American comedy documentary film featuring Bill Maher and directed by Larry Charles. The title of the film is derived from the words religion and ridiculous. The film examines Christianity, Scientology, Mormonism and other.

I have viewed Maher on television over the years and realize he is a critic of religion and have heard his arguments as a critic, but my friend known online as 'Zombie', also known for falling asleep during visits, requested that our mutual friend online known as Uncle Chuck, known for putting people to sleep, and I, review the film with him. Zombie had viewed it previously.

I have asked for these gentlemen to write short reviews.

See Zombie's review in comments.

See Uncle Chuck's review in comments.

Thank you kindly.

Positive

Maher like many critics of religion and Christianity, including for example the ones I dealt with in my MPhil and PhD theodicy/problem of evil research does open up dialogue on certain issues and questions concerning origins, beliefs, the problem of evil and life in general. It is good to ponder on the deeper issues in life.

In doing this he demonstrated that some Christians and religious persons do not study enough to adequately defend their faith and philosophy.

There is a danger of fideism, and in this I mean an over-reliance on faith at the expense of reason.

From:

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Fideism

'The term itself derives from fides, the Latin word for faith, and can be rendered literally as faith-ism.'

'Fideism' is the name given to that school of thought—to which Tertullian himself is frequently said to have subscribed—which answers that faith is in some sense independent of—if not outright adversarial toward—reason. In contrast to the more rationalistic tradition of natural theology, with its arguments for the existence of God, fideism holds that reason is unnecessary and inappropriate for the exercise and justification of religious belief.'

According to R.K. Johnston, fideism is a term used by Protestant modernists in Paris in the late 19th century. It is often used as a pejorative term to attack various strands of Christianity as forms of irrationalism. Johnston (1999: 415). Fideists, following Kant, who noted that reason cannot prove religious truth are said to base their religious understanding upon religious experience alone. Reason is believed to be incapable of establishing faith's certainty or credibility. Johnston (1999: 415). Grenz, Guretzki and Nordling note that fideism states religious and theological truth must be accepted without the use of reason. Grenz, Guretzki and Nordling (1999: 51). An extreme form of fideism states that reason misleads one in religious understanding. Grenz, Guretzki and Nordling (1999: 51).

Negative

At 11:40 roughly with my version of the film Maher basically states paraphrased that there were not eyewitnesses of Christ that wrote the Gospels.

David J. Ellis concerning authorship of the Gospel of John states that in general it is believed in scholarship that the writer was Jewish in Ephesus toward the end of the First Century. There is a theory that three minds, three writers, may have contributed to the writing of the text but there is little agreement on who these could be. There may be a redactor. Ellis notes that Bernard believed John was responsible for the placing of a few minor notes. Ellis (1986: 1230).

Johannine scholar Leon Morris states that there is good reason to believe that the Apostle John was the author of the Gospel of John even though it was anonymous. Morris points out that it was John that was the beloved disciple (John 13: 23) and it was John that was commended to Mary (John 19: 26-27). Morris (1996: 585). These seem reasonable points as this writer seemingly could have been the Apostle John.

I am not stating that the Apostle John by Biblical, theological necessity has to be the author of the Gospel of John, not at all. There were other Apostles that had scribes that could have theoretically written such a work, but John historically has been a very strong candidate and even with what Ellis stated John appeared to be a possibility as one of the three minds that could have written the work, and they were theoretical which means it still could have been one mind.

I would therefore deduce that there were Gospel writers that were witnesses of Christ. John being a very good candidate.

As well concerning Matthew, H.L. Ellison explains that although the Gospel is anonymous there is a strong tradition that 'Matthew' compiled the oracles'. Ellison (1986: 1121).

Matthew like John would be an Apostle and eyewitness.

At the 13:00 mark roughly Maher notes that not all the Gospels contain the virgin birth. As the three of us were watching I confirmed to our group that indeed Mathew and Luke alone had any reference.

This is not a difficulty as the virgin birth only needs to be mentioned once. The Gospel writers are telling one story from four different perspectives and so will highlight different subjects. Also to not present different material would seem like the four books were simply virtual copies of each other.

At the end of the film Maher basically calls for rational non-religious people to unite and to have more of a say in society.

Maher basically did not present good scholarly research for the film, which should have been done even though it was a comedy film. I would be embarrassed to do such a poor job of research professionally in any capacity. We all make mistakes, but that approach is one of lack of in-depth scholarly research.

His approach is one I often come across which assumes that religious people are basically stupid, idiotic, morons and therefore to publicly review religion it does not take much serious research.

These type of people seem rather intellectually oblivious to the fact that places like Harvard, Stanford, Oxford, Cambridge, London, and of course Wales have Religion departments which are often closely associated with Philosophy departments which offer very serious and difficult to obtain Doctorates in the very subjects which Maher likes to joke about, and dismiss.

Yes, I realize there are good Christian institutions but I need to make a point here with secular ones.

These types of persons are oblivious to the amount of difficult thinking and many years of research these issues actually take and so they prefer to deal with mainly lightweight intellectual persons in context to try and make themselves and those with little religious education that watch and support them think they have done well and are winning the intellectual war when in reality they offer no real answers to many of life's most serious and everlasting issues. This is what mainly occurred in the film. In Maher's case he instead offers a world view of 'Doubt'.

The film is humorous is places but laughable as a reasonable academic critique of religion.

ELLIS, DAVID, J. (1986) 'John' in The International Bible Commentary, Grand Rapids, Zondervan.

ELLISON, H.L. (1986) ‘Matthew’, in F.F. Bruce (ed.), The International Bible Commentary, Grand Rapids, Zondervan.

GRENZ, STANLEY J., DAVID GURETZKI and CHERITH FEE

NORDLING (1999) Pocket Dictionary of Theological Terms, Downers Grove, Ill., InterVarsity Press.

JOHNSTON, R.K.(1996) ‘Fideism’, in Walter A. Elwell (ed.), Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, Grand Rapids, Baker Books.

MORRIS, LEON (1996) 'John', in Walter A. Elwell (ed.), Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, Grand Rapids, Baker Books.

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