Minister tells me I'm heading towards
an eternity in the Lake of Fire
because I question the veracity of the Bible

Two weeks ago, I sent out a post questioning whether the god depicted in the Old Testament was really God. My doubts arise from the psychopathic and tyrannical behaviour of Yahweh as depicted in the opening books of the Bible — executing or orchestrating acts of torture, child sacrifice and mass murder (along with lesser crimes of looting, pillaging and enslaving "unchosen" people).

As Father Seán Ólaoire says in his book, Setting God Free, Genesis through Deuteronomy "sounds like a horror story co-written by Edgar Alan Poe and Stephen King."

On the subject of horror authors, my daring to question such Biblical megalomania resulted in this email from Gary Ritter, a minister and a Christian horror novelist:

"None of this is about me. It's about God, His Word, and your reaction to it. I'm not judging you; this is an observation: you have a very hard heart. For proof, we only have to consider the case of Pharaoh in the time of the Exodus. His heart was already hard against God, and God allowed it to harden even more."

Actually, in the Bible, does Yahweh not say, "But I will harden Pharaoh's heart..." (Exodus 7:3)? It was like Yahweh wanted to have an excuse to release all those locusts and kill the firstborns.

Ritter continues: "In so doing, great calamity came upon him and all of Egypt. You are treading on very dangerous ground and I'm trying to warn you."

So Yahweh will hurt me if I question why he hurt and murdered so many people? I think I would need a hard heart not to question such a god.

More gloom and doom from Ritter: "With that said, sometime in the not-too-distant-future[,] some very strange things will happen here in this world. Remember my warning. You will have, hopefully, a final opportunity to turn your life over to God through His Son Jesus Christ."

Apparently, Ritter is not only a prophet but a psychic — he knows whether I've turned my life over to God or not.

Ritter adds: "If you don't, you will doubtless end up taking the Mark of the Beast, which ironically for you could be related to a vaccine. When you take that Mark, it will indicate your allegiance to the Antichrist who will say that he is god."

Kind of like the brutal deity in the Old Testament who says that he is god?

More Ritter prophecies: "Even you will submit to [the Antichrist] unless you have chosen Jesus as Savior and Lord. Mock this all you will, but heed my words. If you choose Antichrist, you will choose eternity in the Lake of Fire. God doesn't want that for you because of His great love for you, but if you continue down this current road, that's where you'll end up."

Well, thanks for the warning... But I think I'll continue down the road of asking questions and not assuming that the long-held consensus around the Bible is true.

This type of "you'll be drowning in the Lake of Fire if you don't believe every word in the Bible" threat seems to stem from the belief that the Bible and God are one and the same — which comes from the idea that the Bible is the "Word of God."

Ever since I was little, I questioned this premise.

Call me simple, but the Bible contains 783,137 words (plural!)— how can so many words be the one true "Word of God"?

On top of that, the words in the Bible contradict each other. In one Gospel story, Jesus remains silent when questioned by Pontious Pilate (Matthew 27:11), while in another book Jesus and the Roman governor have a philosophical discussion about the nature of truth (John 18:38).

The Bible, quite clearly, appears to be the words of men.

When I turned sixteen, I started reading other "holy books" from different cultures. The texts of ancient India presented an interesting alternative to what the "Word of God" really meant which made a whole lot more sense to me.

The Hindu concept suggests that the "Word of God" is an actual word or sound. And there are plenty of verses in the Bible to back up this radical departure from the current consensus.

I'm not saying I know for sure. I'll leave such all-knowing proclamations to people like Gary Ritter who resort to threats of eternal damnation if you don't see things his way. Personally, I think God is far more reasonable and that Truth is open to discussion.

So I'll save my alternative explanation for the "Word of God" until next Sunday. Until then, if you missed any of my recent "heretical" posts, you can read them here:

Sun Feb 4 | Was the God of the Old Testament a psychopathic tyrant? 

Sun Feb 11 | Jewish-born doctor responds to my post about Yahweh's psychopathic behaviour in the Old Testament 

Sun Feb 18 | Christian horror writer tells me that "you have no idea what you're talking about regarding God and the Bible" 

—John C.A. Manley

John C. A. Manley is the author of Much Ado About Corona: A Dystopian Love Story, the forthcoming All The Humans Are Sleeping and other works of speculative fiction. Get free samples of his stories by becoming a Blazing Pine Cone email subscriber at: https://blazingpinecone.com/subscribe/