On Pat Robertson, Consistency, and Earthquakes
I’ve pointed out a time or three that one of the central tenets of modern christianity is that their god, Yahweh, is an absolutely inept communicator, incapable of making himself understood or speaking and a coherent or comprehensible way; the bible is about 90% stuff that you’re apparently not supposed to take literally, or indeed observe at all, and what’s more, it is patently ridiculous to assume that anything that Yahweh says in that book means anything resembling the words actually used to convey it.
It is in light of this that I find it somewhat puzzling that there’s been something of a hew and cry from various christian groups and individuals that Pat Robertson, the host of the popular American television program, The 700 Club, should have made his recent statement on the earthquake in Haiti. In short, for those of you unaware of his words, he said that this earthquake was an act of his god in retaliation for certain Haitians supposedly having made a deal with the devil in order to secure their freedom from their cruel French overlords some two hundred years ago.
To me, this seems entirely logically consistent. A god who could fill his entire holy book with messages which frequently (apparently!) mean the exact inverse of their plainly-expressed meaning would totally do something like this! Think about it, he allows this deal with the devil (which, granted, there exists no historical evidence for) to go down without any sign of his disapproval, and then waits for the culprits to live out their lives in relative peace. He waits a century and a half, and then abruptly lashes out at the people who live on that same island - people who were not involved in the original act, and in many cases are not even descendants of those who were - with an earthquake. This earthquake, among its many other horrible effects, serves additionally to destroy much of their infrastructure, thus making the watching of television essentially impossible. He then communicates his intent in having delivered this earthquake ONLY through a demented and decrepit horrible old man, living in another country altogether, speaking in a language not shared by the majority of the country in question, on a television channel that, through that god’s own supposed works, the majority of the population of the country is incapable of watching.
I fail to see how there’s anything controversial at all about this claim; it is entirely in line with Yahweh’s normal standards for not only communicating incoherently and ineffectively, but punishing those not involved with the initial offense.
I fully expect him to soon vent his wrath for the construction of Stonehenge by dropping a meteor on Melbourne, Australia, and making his intentions clear to the population of that city through a message encoded in the barking of a dog living in Singapore. In the year 1590.
It is in light of this that I find it somewhat puzzling that there’s been something of a hew and cry from various christian groups and individuals that Pat Robertson, the host of the popular American television program, The 700 Club, should have made his recent statement on the earthquake in Haiti. In short, for those of you unaware of his words, he said that this earthquake was an act of his god in retaliation for certain Haitians supposedly having made a deal with the devil in order to secure their freedom from their cruel French overlords some two hundred years ago.
To me, this seems entirely logically consistent. A god who could fill his entire holy book with messages which frequently (apparently!) mean the exact inverse of their plainly-expressed meaning would totally do something like this! Think about it, he allows this deal with the devil (which, granted, there exists no historical evidence for) to go down without any sign of his disapproval, and then waits for the culprits to live out their lives in relative peace. He waits a century and a half, and then abruptly lashes out at the people who live on that same island - people who were not involved in the original act, and in many cases are not even descendants of those who were - with an earthquake. This earthquake, among its many other horrible effects, serves additionally to destroy much of their infrastructure, thus making the watching of television essentially impossible. He then communicates his intent in having delivered this earthquake ONLY through a demented and decrepit horrible old man, living in another country altogether, speaking in a language not shared by the majority of the country in question, on a television channel that, through that god’s own supposed works, the majority of the population of the country is incapable of watching.
I fail to see how there’s anything controversial at all about this claim; it is entirely in line with Yahweh’s normal standards for not only communicating incoherently and ineffectively, but punishing those not involved with the initial offense.
I fully expect him to soon vent his wrath for the construction of Stonehenge by dropping a meteor on Melbourne, Australia, and making his intentions clear to the population of that city through a message encoded in the barking of a dog living in Singapore. In the year 1590.