Suppose There Was No Bible

[luckyme]

Our mind creates a cause-effect perspective.
The main effect of a fresh start would be a greater intelligence/educated divide but still with a fair bit of overlap.
The bible has a running start in western culture and is say, 60-40 in europe presently, those numbers would be more like 30-relig 70 non if starting from a blank religious slate.

There are two types of people that virtually 'need' a religious view ( although not the same one). The regimented hierarchical minds ( represented in the usa by the far right) and the 'mystical' minds, evidenced in the far left. My 30% is my best guess at their combined presence in a typical population.
luckyme

[cpk]

The idea that the Bible (at least the New Testament) is primary to Christianity is relatively new. Early Christians only had fragments of what became the Gospel, and they wrote letters amongst themselves concerning doctrine and practices. The Gospels themselves were composed later. Some of these letters and the Gospels were combined to form what we call the New Testament. By the time this happened, many Christian traditions were already in place.

Suppose the Roman Empire decided to really crack down on Jews and managed to destroy nearly all of the Torah, Nevi'im, and Ketuvim scrolls. In this way, early Christians would not have had access to what they call the Old Testament. They still would've told the stories of creation and the promises of God the best they remembered them. New scriptures would have emerged to replace what was lost.

Ironically, if anything, this would have strengthened the place of tradition in Christian theology. This would have undermined the Reformation, and therefore the Enlightenment may never have happened. . . .

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I just now saw David's second post. I think what David needs to realize is that early Christianity spread primarily by word of mouth, not by people picking up and reading the Bible. It stands to reason that religion would emerge again, but it would look a lot different. Two things--

1. Personification of the creative force behind the Universe is something that is just too easy to do.

2. The idea that this creative force (God) actually became a human being and suffered and died for our sake is an extremely powerful and irresistable idea.

These two ideas are the essence of Christianity. I think the chances are very high that something like this would emerge over the next thousand years, despite our scientific knowledge.

[madnak]

"If God didn't exist, it would be necessary to invent him."

[New001]

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I think a very large percentage, perhaps even close to what there is now, would still end up believing in some sort of creator, higher power, or something similar.

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People try to start new religons all the time but the niche being filled makes it hard for them to take off.

Starting from a fresh slate won't make any different except in the very short term.

chez

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I suppose I should explain my thinking on this. How many religious people today actually critically analyze their beliefs, at least with some rigour? I'm pretty sure the answer is very few. At least in my experience, the group of "I can't fathom how the world was created, God must have done it" is so pervasive that they would just replace their God in that sentence with some other supernatural force.

It doesn't have to be an organized religion. Hopefully this makes sense, I just woke up.

[chezlaw]

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I think a very large percentage, perhaps even close to what there is now, would still end up believing in some sort of creator, higher power, or something similar.

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People try to start new religons all the time but the niche being filled makes it hard for them to take off.

Starting from a fresh slate won't make any different except in the very short term.

chez

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I suppose I should explain my thinking on this. How many religious people today actually critically analyze their beliefs, at least with some rigour? I'm pretty sure the answer is very few. At least in my experience, the group of "I can't fathom how the world was created, God must have done it" is so pervasive that they would just replace their God in that sentence with some other supernatural force.

It doesn't have to be an organized religion. Hopefully this makes sense, I just woke up.

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It has to become organised because folk like to gather together for warm and because its an extremely powerful political lever.

Its not the explanation bit though, mostly people don't believe in god as an explanation of how comes the world exists. They believe because they need meaning to their existence and don't suffer from skepticism.

chez

[New001]

But in the absense of that organized religion, you don't think individuals won't retain that same feeling sans God?

[chezlaw]

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But in the absense of that organized religion, you don't think individuals won't retain that same feeling sans God?

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I don't know but as soon as they get exposed to the idea they will become infected. and its a very simple idea to generate.

The desire for meaning causes the willingness to believe in god which partially causes the generation of religons.

So the removal of religon won't make much difference, removal of credulousness might.

chez

[carlo]

If there were no Bible this would have to come about by Man's not precipitating into the material earthly world.

The Indian Vedas were first written during the ancient Egyptian civilization but the Vedas were a spiritual enlightnment passed on without writing from the Indian civilization which preceeded the Egyptian times. The course of these civilizations were the Indian, Persian, Egyptian, Greco-Roman and our present time.

So in the example of the Vedas what came to be written down was presented to others by spiritual leaders. As the periods of time progressed Mankind also progressed(retrogressed?) in certain understandings but for certain we see a gradual seizing of the material external world. Writing was part of this progress.

To ask, do the Vedas only exist in the written form or are they a written external manifestation of a supersensible reality? Did the ancient Indian during the Indian and Persian time period(read, not written) have a closer grasp of the Vedas.

So in the evolutionary process(precipitation to materialism) writing can be found. Would the truths of the OT/NT be any less true? They are written down consequential to our loss of perception of that reality which underlies our presence and only be totally understood and realized by Mankind's return to a perceptive spiritual state.

"No Bible" could only mean that Man had not precipitated into a densified reality and the consequences as such would not have been in our hands(read, no free will).

The Bible shouldn't be looked at as "only a book" but it too has a history and is consequential to the history of Mankind for which terrific spiritual forces have been brought to bear.

If a magician of some sort could at this very moment remove all trace of the Bible from us it would remove OUR HISTORY. In the medical profession there are stories of people who wake up and have lost complete track of their history. Cannot remember a thing. The Ego of Man needs his history in order to have a sense of self and if he loses it we can talk of dementia/Alzheimers/neurological disorders/etc. This type of loss has also happened to younger people. There is a story of a man who experienced this loss, traveled throughout Europe in an amnesiac loss, and was finally found in a poor house in another country(this is a brief synopsis).

[Piers]

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Anyway if there was nothing written to hang our hats on and no undeniable big time miracles, what would people believe? What percentage of the world having no organized religion to join, would be atheists, deists, theists in a general sense, or theists in a more specifc sense?

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Someone would start an organised religion, probably by writing some book that every one could follow.

[shag]

I think people are inherently spiritual and left to their own devices would believe in some sort of higher power regardless of holy scriptures and organised religion.


That being said people who come to a forum like 2+2 are probably more math science people that would most likely not believe in any higher power at all if organized religion didn't exist. The ones that do in the real world are exceptions and are probably brought up that way.


If there was no bible (or other holy books) I think people would be equally spiritual in general but there would be much less uniformity. I think over a period of thosands of years things would end up pretty simalar to what it is today or even more uniform considering the world is connected now communications wise.