Religulous Is Ridiculous
In his new documentary Religulous, Maher endeavors to explore what he views as the irrationalities of religion and faith with a comedic twist. Maher travels the world, interviewing believers from major faith traditions, including Christianity, Judaism, Islam and Mormonism, stopping everywhere from the Vatican to the Dome of the Rock to a roadside chapel in North Carolina. While attempting to present his views in a humorous way, his main point is simple: religion is inherently irrational and dangerous, and it “must die for mankind to live.”
…Maher thinks he knows so much more about the target of his opprobrium than he actually does. He makes his first mistake in the first line of the movie by referring to the “Book of Revelations” — it’s not plural — and it just snowballs from there.
Within a few minutes Maher is denying not just the divinity of Jesus Christ but his actual historical existence, a question disputed by almost no credible scholar. You can argue that it is difficult to believe in Jesus’s existence considering that primary records for his existence are recorded by only a precious few devoted disciples who recorded his allegorical teachings in detail as well as the social unrest they inspired. Then again, if that’s the standard – you probably don’t believe Socrates either.
Still, Maher isn’t exactly on solid ground in questioning what he sees as the more fantastical elements of Christianity. Maher asserts that there are a slew of uncanny similarities between Mithraism and the worship of the Egyptian god Horus, on one hand, and Christianity, on the other, and that these beliefs, which predate Christianity, were bastardized to make up the foundations of the new religion. Here too he falls flat on his face; at best there are some commonalities (present among nearly all religions), and most of the specific similarities asserted in the film, e.g., that Jesus, Mithras, and Horus were all the product of virgin births, come from dubious sources.
The example of the virgin birth is particularly telling because Maher makes much hay of the fact that only two of the four Gospels mention the circumstances of Jesus’s birth. That others would omit this important fact is somehow proof that they were making it up. Well, Mithras was born out of rock (and the earliest known account of his origins seems to postdate the writing of the Gospels), and Horus was conceived by his mother Isis with a golden penis which may make her not quite a virgin? For the Gospel writers to ignore the virgin birth is no more strange than for a comedian to ignore the existence of the penis and all of the potential for hilarity it presents. Unfortunately, Maher ignores it because it doesn’t make his case. And again, we’re just getting started dissecting the facts in Maher’s documentary.
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I haven’t seen the movie (and don’t really plan to). My main concern, however, is not Maher’s irreligious brand of humor, but how Christians should respond, generally, to ridicule and scorn. Is Bill Maher Religulous?
Um, clearly whoever wrote this didn’t watch the movie (hilarious, with equal opportunity skewering! no religion got off easy..)
And nothing you wrote can refute the main point, which is that all religions are grounded heavily in myth and things that are patently ridiculous and can not be proven by the faithful…
Hey, and just like with those Harry Potter books you love to hate on so much, none of the “supernatural” events (virgin birth… hahahahaha, best excuse ever!), flood covering the entire earth, women being made from a man’s rib (???) can be proven! Ever. It’s all made up. Prove it happened, I dare you.
Granted, the Bible is valuable as a historical document, and clearly a lot of what it contains is based in or on historical figures and occurrences, but it was written by man, and has evolved considerably since its inception…
anyone remember Jerry McGuire’s “you had me at hello”?
well Christianity lost me at “god told abraham to sacrifice his son” and it pretty much just goes downhill from there. I mean REALLY????? you can try to “explain” it to me all day, but there is only one way to interpretate that and it is this…..the god of the old testament is petty and insecure like a teenage girl. HE is like a 3 year old constantly throwing a tantrum, but HIS tantrums cause death and destruction. otherwise, rational thinking people, go apeshit when you try to point out the fact that if anyone did that today, they would be in prison for attempted murder, child endangerment, something…………..anyway. Mahrer hits it on the head everytime! the three major religions have suspicious similiarites with myths thousands of years before their time and they all seem to take pride in their own ignorance and judgement. it seems everyone wants to be “be part of something” and that is what religion does, it is a soft, warm, sweet-smelling security blanket that protects them from their most basic fear……death.
remember what george kastanza said……”if YOU believe it, it is not a lie”. and that is why OJ thinks he is innocent and muslims think there are 32 virgins waiting on them in heaven!!!!!
If you would really take the time to live by the bible and really ask God, Jesus Christ, to help you understand then you willl know that there is a God, and that he love you, so much that he came into human form and died for you and me.