Who First Taught People About God?
Today I have heard probably the single worst argument for the existence of God that I have ever heard. This argument is so stupid that it amazes me what lengths people go with mental gymnastics in order to justify their imaginary friend.
If people are indoctrinated into belief in God and people are manipulated by others who believe in God then who first taught people to believe in God? Clearly, God must have taught people Himself.
That is what this Christian is arguing. God must exist because someone needed to teach people to believe and that someone is God. This Christian obviously has not thought that through. The implication of this argument is that anything that is imagined must have some basis in reality and must in fact be real. This would mean that Unicorns are real because only a unicorn could teach the concept of a unicorn to people.
What this Christian fails to realize is that while everything imagined does have some basis in reality, it does not follow that everything imagined is real. A unicorn is a horse with a horn. Both things are real and are based in reality, but it is the human imagination which has put them together.
When a baby’s parent leaves the room, a baby thinks that his or her parent has left existence. The baby learns that some times when people leave their view, they still exist. People needed to know how the world worked and so they made up gods to explain the causes of the effects that they saw. They thought that perhaps the gods had left the room much like a parent. Now of course we have better explanations for how the world works. Rain is no longer the gods crying. Thunder is no longer a bowling game of the gods. The wind is no longer God breathing heavy. A drought no longer means that God is angry.
People imagined gods based on real problems and real questions. The fact is that gods are based in reality. They strangely resemble us! Humans weren’t created in God’s image, but rather God was created in our image. There is an old saying that says that if a triangle had a god, he would have three sides.
God is a father, humans have fathers. God has a son, humans have sons. God has human emotions like jealousy, wrath, anger, etc. God is a projection of ourselves. That is why some people see God as a peace loving hippy and other people see God as an authoritarian dictator. God is a supercharged mirror. So if you are a god-believer ask yourself, “What is God like to you? What does that say about you?”
Filed under: god, image of god, Ontological Argument, Projection, Religion
