The video opens with Bill standing on a pile of rocks - "I'm standing on the very spot where Christians believe the world will come to an end. It's called Megiddo, and it's the place that the Book of Revelations says Jesus Christ will come down to, end the world, and save the people who believe in him. Now, when Revelations was written, only God had the capacity to end the world, but now man does too because unfortunately, before man figured out how to be rational or peaceful, he figured out how to make nuclear weapons and pollute on a catastrophic scale. If there's one thing I hate more than prophecy, it's self fulfilling prophecy."
It's a great place to start off a documentary to demonstrate his doubts about religion. I share the same doubts, and watching this just reinforced all of them. This is my favourite kind of documentary - it answers a lot of questions, but leaves me with many more. In a past life, I would have found that incredibly frustrating, but now, I'd rather be left to think about the answers myself than to accept somebody else's answer as my own.
As background, after living in Qatar between the ages of 9 and 12, I went to boarding school in Cyprus for just over a year. It was run by born again Christians, and please don't imagine they were anything like the Evangelists on US tv, because they couldn't have been further from that image. My friends find it highly amusing to discover that at the age of 13 I was teaching bible study classes to the kindergarten children - and not only was I teaching those classes, but I was writing the lessons myself. I've studied the bible, and I promise you, there's a lot of good stuff in there. The problem is, as far as I can see it, there's also a lot of out of date and sometimes completely ridiculous stuff in there as well.
What I took away from that time of intensive study of the bible was that god is love, we should treat other people as we'd like to be treated, and that we should do nice things for people (The Good Samaritan story) I'm sure I took more than this away, but these basics have done me very well in the intervening years, despite having been a non-practicing, non-denominational. sometimes atheist, mostly "spiritual but not religious" being.
Maher speaks to various denominations of Christianity in the first section and admits that he's preaching "the Gospel of I don't know". While he's here, he questions the list of widely held beliefs that aren't even mentioned in the bible at all, or are only mentioned in one Gospel (like the virgin birth... who knew that was only in 2 versions of the bible??) Then there's the question of homosexuality. He points out many times that *man* wrote the bible, and that homosexuality exists in nature. Nature is wholly accepting of homosexuality, but certain sections of humanity see it as a complete abomination. Hmmm...
It's also interesting to note that the interviewees regularly get angry with Bill, and threaten to end the interview rather than having a rational discussion with him. Their beliefs are obviously very important to them, but to me, if someone questions my beliefs on any subject, then I want to engage with them and discuss my reasoning.
Whilst talking to a Jews For Jesus follower about his belief in miracles, the guy tells Bill a story about sticking his hand out of the window to fill his cup with water and pray for rain. It started raining so hard that his cup filled and people were unable to leave the party. Bill ridicules his belief that this was a miracle, because "it rains! That's not a miracle". I tend to disagree with this; in my view, a miracle is in the eye of the beholder.
Last week my youngest was home for the weekend and wanted to visit her Nan and her sister, and had plans to play bingo with Nan later on in the evening. I was late getting ready to meet her at her sister's house, so I decided to go to the bingo with them later rather than go home again half an hour after seeing them. My daughter shouted "house" on the last game of the night, and we shared the £100 between us. So, not only did I get to spend extra time with my lovely daughter, but I got to see my equally lovely other daughter and grandson, indulged in some play time, enjoyed my ex mother in law's company, all for free and went home with some extra money in my pocket! That's a little miracle in my eyes, and to be honest, it makes no difference to me if you think that's just life, because that little miracle (or set of miracles) made my day!
It's worth pointing out that religion means a lot to it's followers. There are millions of people who gain great comfort from their chosen religion, but there are a lot of people who get so involved in religion that they ignore certain parts of it for their own benefit, and that's what I struggle with. The 10 Commandments have always been purported to have come from a god in the sky. Maybe Moses did speak to god, I wasn't there so I don't know, but I find it peculiar that 3 of the commandments are for god's protection rather than for the people. The tradition of man-made laws has followed on from these "commandments from god" ever since. Men writing laws that are supposedly for the good of everyone, but really only benefit those who know how to get around them (think tax laws as an example). As Bill points out, why isn't there a commandment about not abusing children?
He talks to some very interesting people, like the Vatican Observatory's head. A Vatican Astronomer!! That's a surprise! There are quite a few gems of people within this film, and I especially love the priest outside the Vatican that Bill calls a Maverick. If all priests were like him, I'd have a lot more time for organised religion (although I'd still take the bits that resonate and discard the bits that don't).
To me, all of the holy books should be seen as snippets of history. They were written by men who may or may not have been around for the events they wrote about. The scriptures are one person's view of events which will have been interpreted differently by each of the other witnesses to the event. They contain the views of the individuals who wrote them, and therefore need to be read with an open mind. Times change, people change, the world at large changes, and popular opinion changes with all of the above. Just because homosexuality was frowned upon 2,000 or more years ago, does that mean that we're not allowed to evolve past that stage because someone who wrote an article for a book that later came to be seen as "holy" disagreed with it?
There's a Holy Land Experience in Orlando. Oh wow... seriously? How much money does that little (huge!) enterprise drag in from the poor unsuspecting souls who want some comfort in a time of need? The senior manager of public relations doesn't like that Bill's interviewing their Jesus... I did love the witch's cackle that announced her arrival! Their Jesus actually makes a lot of good points, he clearly does believe in his god.
On the other hand, Bill makes a lot of good points as well. Why would an all powerful god have allowed the Holocaust to happen? "Jesus" says this is because god is more powerful than you or I, and likens it to trying to explain how tv works to an ant - the ant isn't on the right intellectual level to understand the explanation, and we're not on the right intellectual level to understand god's purpose or method of thinking.
I agree with both of them. How very Libran of me! I do genuinely think both of them are right in some things, but equally, I believe they're both also wrong in others - or at least, they're both looking at it from the wrong perspective.
In my opinion, god is within each of us. That omnipotence, omnipresence, omni-whatever-else-(s)he-can-do, is because we all have thoughts. We all have free will. We all have the power to make the right choice, and equally, we have the power to make the wrong choice. We all have the capacity to follow a path of evil, or the path of good. Whichever path we choose determines the outcome.
Basically, "Judge not, lest ye be judged" is bloody good common sense to me, and yet it's ignored in every single religion and every single law of every single land. If religion is so central to everything, why do we have courts, laws, police, barristers, and everyone else involved in the judgment profession? Why are we imprisoning and killing people "in the name of the (man made) law" on a daily basis? Why are American prisons so overflowing with young people who have shown true remorse for what they've done? Have you ever felt guilty about something? I mean something small, like the time you said something that unintentionally hurt someone you care about. Remember how that guilt almost consumed you until you apologised? And then how you still felt bad until you were sure they'd forgiven you? Imagine that multiplied for the person who got drunk and crashed the car, killing the three close friends who were in the car with them at the same time, or the dad who took his kid fishing and the child fell into the lake and drowned. I'm not for a second saying let's get rid of all laws, but I do think that there are reams of them that should be consigned to the history books, and cases where human decency should be brought into play far more often than the written laws of the land.
There are fundamental natural laws that can't be ignored. The Fibonacci Sequence for example. The images there show that it's a law that exists anywhere you care to examine in nature, and you don't need to be a mathematical genius to see it.
The taking of another life is debatable, because in nature, animals kill and eat each other all the time. It's the circle of life. Does that mean it's ok for humans to go around killing each other? No. The only way I can align that in my Utopian daydream is that there are small communities of cannibals. Some people want to eat human flesh, some people want those people to eat their flesh. Put them together, and give them a place where they can happily eat flesh from each other without actually causing death, and let them get on with it. It's their choice; just because I don't want to eat or be eaten doesn't make me automatically wrong. If they're happy with it, let them get on with it - who am I to judge? As long as there's informed consent, do what you like. Just don't try to force anyone else into it. That goes for religion, politics, sex, anything you can think of. By all means let other people in on your beliefs, and discuss them if the other person wants to, but you can't make anyone feel something they don't feel. We all need to take responsibility for our own actions, and stop worrying about other people's actions.
Gosh, that was a new rabbit hole, even for me!
It's a widely held belief that most of the wars that have ever taken place have been due to religion. Between religion and politics, millions of people have lost their lives, and Megiddo is a perfect case in point. The Jews and Muslims have been fighting and arguing over that site for centuries. Why can't they just accept that everyone has their own little story behind it, and that just because their story disagrees slightly with yours, they're automatically wrong? Why can't everyone just go and do their own private pilgrimage without having to attack the other person's beliefs in the process?
That's what I can't reconcile when it comes to religion of any sort. Why is your set of beliefs any more correct than theirs? Why aren't they entitled to hold their own beliefs and leave you to hold yours, without each of you trying to kill the other?
Whatever happened to ""Thou shalt not kill"?
There's an awful lot more covered in Religulous, much of which will cause you to question your own beliefs if you approach it with an open mind. One of the things I found most interesting was the number of sub-sections within each religion. Some of those sub-sections fundamentally disagree with others within the same religious umbrella. That alone is enough to tell me that religion needs to be consigned to the"History" section, along with many of our man-made laws.
I highly recommend Religulous, even if just for the comparisons between the story of Jesus and the tales of the previous 1000+ years, about Krishna, Horus, and many others. Jonathan Boulden (a visitor at the Holy Land Experience, which still makes me roll my eyes by it's very existence!) deserves a mention of his own, because he brings Star Wars into it and notes that in Episode 1, Annakin was born to a virgin. I bloody knew all of this would connect! Just wait til next December, I'll have lots to say on this subject over the next 12 months, I'm sure!
Before Bill left there, "Jesus" asked Bill "What if you're wrong?", which Bill in turn asked him back. "Jesus" looked a bit uncomfortable about that, and didn't give a reply (to my knowledge!) but if someone asks me that question, my reply will be "I've been the best person I could possibly be, and worked to improve on my weaknesses as I noticed them". If that's not good enough then so be it. At least I know I tried my best :)
Bill gets kicked off site by several religious organisations, which again, I find telling. I guess it could tell a story that a lot of the newer religions are more than used to public ridicule, so they might just be trying to protect themselves... but really, in my view, if they had nothing to hide (ie they fully believed in their religion) they'd engage in discussion about it. Some of the revelations in this film are eye-poppingly unbelievable! I have no idea how people manage to align themselves with this stuff and go back for more every week!
When Bill moves on to Judaism, I'm afraid do want to give him a shove and tell him to be quiet for a minute. He doesn't give the Rabbi any time to speak, but I do feel that he may have had some really interesting things to say. He doesn't believe in a Jewish State, and that Jews will only see the sacred place when they reach a higher level of (godliness?) That makes sense to me, he spoke of a compassionate god, which is quite different from the jealous god mentioned when he spoke to Christians. It could have added quite a bit to the debate for me, but there you go, I can't change that :)
The next Jews he speaks to are basically spending their lives finding loopholes in the extremely strict rules around the Sabbath. Very amusing!
There's also a very clever comparison between the Old Testament and madness - hopefully it'll make some people think!
Then we come to a man who proclaims he's the second coming of Jesus Christ. People pay him for that, he has followers, and says that Jesus of Nazareth had a wife and Jesus's seed was spread across Europe and into Puerto Rico, so he's a descendant. Woah!! Very funny section, I like Bill a lot!
We then move to Amsterdam and the religion of Cantheism, interspersed with conversations about Islam. Also a very interesting section, with some great questions, and a variety of answers. I did feel a bit sorry for the Gay Muslims, they really didn't look amused, and they do have balls for going on a show like that. Well done them!
We're shown the contrast between the Imam in the mosque saying that "Islam preaches above all peace, peace, peace" and then the video cuts to an Ayatollah of some description shouting about killing the infidels. It seems to me that the peaceful Muslims blame the violence and killing on politics, and the non-peaceful muslims say they're acting on religious grounds. It's everyone else's fault. Obviously!
With that sort of contradiction within one book, how is anyone supposed to know what they're supposed to be doing in the name of God? And I'm not just talking about the Quran here, I mean any holy scripture that can be interpreted as condoning violence, and that includes the Bible.
Thou shalt not kill.
Judge not, lest ye be judged.
Not doing so well on either of those are we? As a planet I mean. Humankind has messed up big time when it comes to religion as far as I'm concerned.
Bill goes back to Jerusalem for the next section, to where Solomon's temple used to be, and now the Muslims have built the Dome of the Rock. There's an interesting story as to why Muslims all face towards Mecca when they pray, I knew they did it, but not the reason why. Then there's a round up of who feels this site is particularly holy and why they feel like that, and it just leaves me wishing for a world where everyone can travel freely to a place that is important to them, no matter what their race, religion, gender, as long as they're going there for peaceful reasons. Stop fighting over the toys children, and play nicely!!
Then we visit the "giant naked man with a sizeable erection" at Cerne Abbas. In Bill's opinion it's all just about tradition without really knowing why things are done that way. In all honesty, I think he's right in many cases. Actually, in most cases more than likely.
"If the world does come to an end here, or wherever, or if it limps into the future, decimated by the effects of religion-inspired nuclear terrorism, let's remember what the real problem was that we learned how to precipitate mass death before we got past the neurological disorder of wishing for it. That's it. Grow up or die."
Bill Maher
You can watch Bill's film HERE - If you don't have a Netflix account, I'm sure it's available elsewhere as well. I'm not affiliated with anyone and will receive no monetary payment for this blog - but as Netflix have a month free trial, you literally have nothing to lose and potentially, everything to gain!
