Kantian Naturalist and I have been hopscotching from thread to thread, discussing the nature of religious language. The main point of contention is the assertoric/disclosive distinction: When is religious language assertoric — that is, when does it make claims about reality — and when is it merely disclosive, revealing attitude and affect without making actual claims?
I’ve created this thread as a permanent home for this otherwise nomadic discussion.
It may also be a good place for an ongoing discussion of another form of religious language — scripture. For believers who take scripture to be divinely inspired, the question is when it should be taken literally, when it should be taken figuratively or metaphorically, and whether there are consistent and justifiable criteria for drawing that distinction.
I’m not sure what you’re asking here, Patrick. I thought Fifth made a pretty good case that, e.g., “world” might have meant something different when the Bible was written than it means today. If so, and what whatever that writer meant was correct in some sentence, would you still call that sentence false?
Again, if you said “I’m the happiest guy in the world” when, e.g., you discovered Ayn Rand, was it false?
Erik’s point here is, if I understand him correctly, no more than the perfectly obvious thought that one needs to take into account context, history, language, culture, etc. in order to figure out what “the literal meaning” even is. I don’t see why that should be so hard to understand, but it seems to have stumped many of you (assuming I’m correct about what Erik is saying).
What “the whole earth” would have meant to Iron Age shepherds and warriors is not what it means to us today, because our understanding of geography is not theirs. That doesn’t mean that there is no literal meaning within their conceptual framework. But it does give us reasons to think that the literal meaning of the text is not what should (or even can?) matter to us.
Quite so, KN.
“Covered the earth” may literally mean “covered the earth”, but does this guarantee that we agree what “covered the earth” means? For example, does it have to mean “covered the whole planet Earth”? It actually could mean that.
Literalist fundies would be quick to point out to you that roughly 3/4 of the planet is still covered in water, so it looks like the water of the flood is still covering the Earth! Feel free to argue against this. Words taken out of context can mean anything and literalists are experts at making words mean whatever they want. You cannot win such debates, but you are sure to miss the point of the scriptures when you try.
The flood described in Genesis is global. The story makes no sense in terms of a local flood. See for yourselves:
Wickedness in the World
6 When human beings began to increase in number on the earth and daughters were born to them, 2 the sons of God saw that the daughters of humans were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose. 3 Then the Lord said, “My Spirit will not contend with humans forever, for they are mortal; their days will be a hundred and twenty years.”
4 The Nephilim were on the earth in those days—and also afterward—when the sons of God went to the daughters of humans and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown.
5 The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time. 6 The Lord regretted that he had made human beings on the earth, and his heart was deeply troubled. 7 So the Lord said, “I will wipe from the face of the earth the human race I have created—and with them the animals, the birds and the creatures that move along the ground—for I regret that I have made them.” 8 But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.
Noah and the Flood
9 This is the account of Noah and his family.
Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and he walked faithfully with God. 10 Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham and Japheth.
11 Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight and was full of violence. 12 God saw how corrupt the earth had become, for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways. 13 So God said to Noah, “I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth. 14 So make yourself an ark of cypress wood; make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out. 15 This is how you are to build it: The ark is to be three hundred cubits long, fifty cubits wide and thirty cubits high.[d] 16 Make a roof for it, leaving below the roof an opening one cubit[e] high all around.[f] Put a door in the side of the ark and make lower, middle and upper decks. 17 I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish. 18 But I will establish my covenant with you, and you will enter the ark—you and your sons and your wife and your sons’ wives with you. 19 You are to bring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep them alive with you. 20 Two of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of every kind of creature that moves along the ground will come to you to be kept alive. 21 You are to take every kind of food that is to be eaten and store it away as food for you and for them.”
22 Noah did everything just as God commanded him.
7 The Lord then said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and your whole family, because I have found you righteous in this generation. 2 Take with you seven pairs of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and one pair of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate, 3 and also seven pairs of every kind of bird, male and female, to keep their various kinds alive throughout the earth. 4 Seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living creature I have made.”
5 And Noah did all that the Lord commanded him.
6 Noah was six hundred years old when the floodwaters came on the earth. 7 And Noah and his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives entered the ark to escape the waters of the flood. 8 Pairs of clean and unclean animals, of birds and of all creatures that move along the ground, 9 male and female, came to Noah and entered the ark, as God had commanded Noah. 10 And after the seven days the floodwaters came on the earth.
11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, on the seventeenth day of the second month—on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened. 12 And rain fell on the earth forty days and forty nights.
13 On that very day Noah and his sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth, together with his wife and the wives of his three sons, entered the ark. 14 They had with them every wild animal according to its kind, all livestock according to their kinds, every creature that moves along the ground according to its kind and every bird according to its kind, everything with wings. 15 Pairs of all creatures that have the breath of life in them came to Noah and entered the ark. 16 The animals going in were male and female of every living thing, as God had commanded Noah. Then the Lord shut him in.
17 For forty days the flood kept coming on the earth, and as the waters increased they lifted the ark high above the earth. 18 The waters rose and increased greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the surface of the water. 19 They rose greatly on the earth, and all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered. 20 The waters rose and covered the mountains to a depth of more than fifteen cubits. 21 Every living thing that moved on land perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. 22 Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. 23 Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark.
24 The waters flooded the earth for a hundred and fifty days.
8 But God remembered Noah and all the wild animals and the livestock that were with him in the ark, and he sent a wind over the earth, and the waters receded. 2 Now the springs of the deep and the floodgates of the heavens had been closed, and the rain had stopped falling from the sky. 3 The water receded steadily from the earth. At the end of the hundred and fifty days the water had gone down, 4 and on the seventeenth day of the seventh month the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. 5 The waters continued to recede until the tenth month, and on the first day of the tenth month the tops of the mountains became visible.
6 After forty days Noah opened a window he had made in the ark 7 and sent out a raven, and it kept flying back and forth until the water had dried up from the earth. 8 Then he sent out a dove to see if the water had receded from the surface of the ground. 9 But the dove could find nowhere to perch because there was water over all the surface of the earth; so it returned to Noah in the ark. He reached out his hand and took the dove and brought it back to himself in the ark. 10 He waited seven more days and again sent out the dove from the ark. 11 When the dove returned to him in the evening, there in its beak was a freshly plucked olive leaf! Then Noah knew that the water had receded from the earth. 12 He waited seven more days and sent the dove out again, but this time it did not return to him.
13 By the first day of the first month of Noah’s six hundred and first year, the water had dried up from the earth. Noah then removed the covering from the ark and saw that the surface of the ground was dry. 14 By the twenty-seventh day of the second month the earth was completely dry.
15 Then God said to Noah, 16 “Come out of the ark, you and your wife and your sons and their wives. 17 Bring out every kind of living creature that is with you—the birds, the animals, and all the creatures that move along the ground—so they can multiply on the earth and be fruitful and increase in number on it.”
18 So Noah came out, together with his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives. 19 All the animals and all the creatures that move along the ground and all the birds—everything that moves on land—came out of the ark, one kind after another.
20 Then Noah built an altar to the Lord and, taking some of all the clean animals and clean birds, he sacrificed burnt offerings on it. 21 The Lord smelled the pleasing aroma and said in his heart: “Never again will I curse the ground because of humans, even though[i] every inclination of the human heart is evil from childhood. And never again will I destroy all living creatures, as I have done.
22 “As long as the earth endures,
seedtime and harvest,
cold and heat,
summer and winter,
day and night
will never cease.”
God’s Covenant With Noah
9 Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth. 2 The fear and dread of you will fall on all the beasts of the earth, and on all the birds in the sky, on every creature that moves along the ground, and on all the fish in the sea; they are given into your hands. 3 Everything that lives and moves about will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.
4 “But you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it. 5 And for your lifeblood I will surely demand an accounting. I will demand an accounting from every animal. And from each human being, too, I will demand an accounting for the life of another human being.
6 “Whoever sheds human blood,
by humans shall their blood be shed;
for in the image of God
has God made mankind.
7 As for you, be fruitful and increase in number; multiply on the earth and increase upon it.”
8 Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him: 9 “I now establish my covenant with you and with your descendants after you 10 and with every living creature that was with you—the birds, the livestock and all the wild animals, all those that came out of the ark with you—every living creature on earth. 11 I establish my covenant with you: Never again will all life be destroyed by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth.”
12 And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: 13 I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth. 14 Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds, 15 I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. 16 Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.”
17 So God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant I have established between me and all life on the earth.”
Right, keiths. But it could still have been of any random geographical extent, because the story doesn’t say how many humans there were and how compactly they lived.
Moreover, the common concept of time tended to be cyclical in pre-modern times, so it may be describing an amalgam of similar events, not necessarily a single one. And you never know how correct the translation is, for example there’s uncertainty about the measurement units.
To summarize, the more literal you are, the more lost you are about the meaning.
The interpretative complexities increase considerably when one takes into account that ancient Hebrew doesn’t have written vowels or punctuation. There are decisions to be made in determining when a sentence begins or ends, when someone is being quoted, and even what any word is!
This is why I have three Bibles — the Jewish Publication Society translation for the English translation of the Old Testament unfiltered by Christian assumptions, the Revised Standard Version because it’s most common among scholars, and the King James for the poetry and historical impact on the English language.
(Let’s face it: “I am a brother to dragons and a companion to owls” sounds much better than “I have become a brother to jackals and a companion to ostriches” (KJV vs JPS translation of Job 30:29)!)
You are mistaken. You and keiths are as much engaged in interpretation as anyone else when you claim (or imply) that the text has a literal meaning or reading and that, for example, the ‘literal’ reading is that the entire globe was covered by water.
The question is, which of you has made the case that the reading you are giving the text is it’s ‘literal’ meaning?
You mean it makes no sense to you, a non-believer, living thousands of years after the text was written, living, quite literally, in a different world.
Does it ever even use the word hell?
By the way, if you think it’s unfiltered by Christian assumptions you’re naive.
No. There is Sheol, which is different from the Christian idea of Hell. Apparently the idea of Gehenna as a place of eternal punishment emerges in Rabbinic Judaism; in the Hebrew Bible itself, Gehenna is a particularly bad place.
I don’t understand what you mean by this claim.
Kantian Naturalist,
Certainly, but that’s from the perspective that the book was written by those iron age people. Erik says that he thinks the Bible is divinely inspired. That’s a different context entirely.
Erik,
That does appear to be the literal meaning.
I’m not trying to play games with you. I genuinely don’t understand your position. You talk about the Bible being literally correct on the one hand, but throw in a lot of interpretation with the other.
Perhaps the confusion isn’t about what the Bible (divinely inspired, according to you) means by “the earth” but what you mean by “literal.”
That looks like a false dichotomy to me, since there’s a lot of ambiguity in that word, “inspired”.
For example, I myself think that the experience of the encounter with the divine is always going to be refracted through the lens provided by the prevalent conceptual framework. How the warrior shepherds of the Iron Age Levant interpreted that encounter is going to be quite different from how a decently educated citizen of the First World in the 21st century is going to interpret that encounter.
I know that that results in a very radical “theology”, because it means that the Bible has no privileged status as a record of revelation. And I put “theology” in scare-quotes because I separate metaphysics from religious discourse. I am, basically, a heterodox positivist. The logical positivists insisted on a wall of separation between science and poetry, and opposed metaphysics because they saw it as breaching that wall. I think that Peirce, Dewey, and Sellars were right in arguing that we can’t do science without metaphysics, so I put metaphysics on the science side of that wall. But there’s no reason why religion can’t be put on the poetry side of that wall.
Hence my distinction, with which my conversation with keiths began, between assertoric statements (science, philosophy) and disclosive statements (poetry, religion).
The confusion here, as I pointed out above, is that you and keiths both think that your interpretation is:
1.) Not interpretation
2.) THE “literal” interpretation.
Does that help? Do you see how absurd that is?
Whether or not either of you care to admit to making this claim, it is absolutely implicit in your arguments. Do either of you intend to defend your claim?
Which part of your “the literal meaning of the text is [insert your interpretation of the text here]” is not your interpretation of the text?
Erik,
Even if you had some basis for assuming that the entire human population was confined to that local area — and you don’t — it wouldn’t come close to solving your problem. It wasn’t just the humans (except for Noah et al) that God wanted to wipe out — it was the animals, too:
And:
A local flood doesn’t destroy “every creature that has the breath of life in it”.
The Bible describes a global flood. No such flood ever happened. So when Erik says that the literal interpretation of the flood story is true, along with the other interpretations, “all at the same time”, he is wrong.
My problem? Can you spell out what you take my problem to be?
Of course it does – in that locality. Let me spell out your problem – you are not even close establishing whether the flood was local, global, or whether it did or didn’t occur.
You have no reason to argue against that it was local – because maybe I suppose that it was in fact global. You have no reason to argue against that it was global either – because maybe I suppose it was in fact local. I haven’t stated my position yet!
Care to cite some evidence? Something that would convince a literalist who supposes that a global flood is in fact ongoing. Note that ice age is evidence for flood. Do you know of a spot on earth that has not been ocean bottom at some point?
There are plenty (other) things in the Bible that cannot be taken literally. For example I mentioned the prophecy of Immanuel which the New Testament evangelist takes to be about Jesus. Things like this have posed no problem for Christianity. Guess why. They only puzzle literalists. The mainstream exegesis has never been literalist.
Heh, like you’ve got some special insight!
You are sophisticated enough to know that there is no evidence for a worldwide flood. So to you the text must say something other then what it ostensibly says.
Others are happy to believe in such a flood however. I’ve talked to such people extensively in the past as it happens.
So once you’ve dispensed with Keiths, you’ll have to turn to the rest of the interpretations you disagree with.
Kantian Naturalist,
I agree, but millions of believers don’t. And they vote.
And your point here being — what, exactly? That I’m somehow responsible for this? Or that I have an obligation to persuade people of faith to be take up a less assertoric (epistemological/metaphysical) attitude towards their own commitments? Or something else entirely? I ask because I’m genuinely puzzled as to why you bring this up as a response to me.
Besides which, there are millions of people of faith who support the same social policies I support, and millions of atheists and agnostics who support the social policies that I oppose, so I don’t see the relevance in that respect, either.
Kantian Naturalist,
Was it you? What are the odds I’d find the culprit here!
I bring this up as a response because, while I might agree with you about how religion could (or even should) be viewed, your position is not that of the majority of theists. I wouldn’t care about the topic at all if people treated religious beliefs like preferences in literature. The problem is, again especially here in the U.S., the Bible is used as a justification for laws oppress non-believers in general and women and minorities in particular.
It’s important to challenge this dangerous nonsense whenever possible.
Yes, of course. Though historically speaking the Bible has also been used to justify criticism and resistance to oppression. One of the big mistakes made by the Left in the US was to allow the religious right to commandeer moral and religious discourse.
I agree with that, of course. But what makes it dangerous nonsense is that divine command theory is both false (as an ethical theory) and is used to justify oppressive social practices. It’s a very specific (and, I think, internally incoherent) reading of Scripture that’s at work there, not the use of Scripture per se. (Martin Luther King and Abraham Heschel did not interpret Scripture that way!)
I’m sure you can cite examples.
Sure.
JPS Tanakh 1917
He that oppresseth the poor blasphemeth his Maker; But he that is gracious unto the needy honoureth Him. Proverbs 14:31
Want more?
http://www.openbible.info/topics/oppression
http://bible.knowing-jesus.com/topics/Oppression,-God~s-Attitude-To
Of course. But is that a challenge to do so, or reassurance that one could do so?
Kantian Naturalist,
We’re in agreement there. I have an aunt and uncle (they do often come in pairs) who are members of one of the most far right, fundamentalist churches in the area where I grew up. The preacher in that church is definitely into divine command theory. They’re also the most decent human beings I know. I think they’re wonderful despite their religion, not because of it
The opposite also occurs, far too often. Weinberg’s famous quote comes to mind “Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.”
So even if you can conceive of a kinder, gentler theism, unfortunately that’s not what we have on the ground in the U.S. I wish you luck in presenting believers with an alternative, but I suspect we’re in for a bigger fight before the majority of them start dying off.
You’ve misinterpreted Weinberg. What he literally means is that without religion there is no good and no evil. So for good people to do evil things it does take religion. It also takes religion for good people to do good things, and for evil people to do evil things.
That has to be the dumbest thing I’ve read today.
Mung reads Weinberg the way he reads the Bible: tendentiously.
Is there an award?
On the contrary, I admit that I am engaged in interpretation. You take exception to my interpretation. It is you who are being tendentious.
Do you [and Patrick] deny that you are engaged in interpreting the text?
Not tendentiously, unlike you.
Mung,
Of course, that’s why he wrote, in the passage I quoted, “With or without it you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things.” Clearly he was saying that religion is required for good an evil.
Bring NewMung back, please. His reading comprehension is better.
Reading comprehension takes into account not only what is said but also what is not said. By the way, when you read, you interpret what you read. When you, Patrick, read the Bible, you are interpreting the text.
Perhaps you and keiths can get together and agree that your interpretation is not tendentious. But if that’s the case, why are people arguing with you about it?
Mung,
Because theirs is.
The people arguing with us are Christians who want the Bible to be correct. They can’t afford to interpret the flood story straightforwardly, because then they would have to admit that the Bible is wrong. Science shows that there was no global flood.
Their tendentious interpretations are attempts to rescue the Bible from the obvious conclusion: that it isn’t the infallible word of God.
Patrick,
I would say that Weinberg got it wrong: for good people to do evil things requires ideology, not religion.
Some forms of religion are ideologies, and some are not; some ideologies are religious and some are not.
KN,
Any response to these?
KN,
But religion is full of assertoric statements, as you yourself acknowledged:
Don’t confuse how the world is with how you want it to be.
I’ve selected passages from the flood story and added comments showing just how obvious it is that the flood, as described in Genesis, was global. The local flood interpretation is a blatant distortion of what the text clearly says.
He’s talking about all humans and all animals. This ain’t no local flood.
He’s talking about everybody — all people — in case you didn’t get the message the first time.
You wouldn’t need an ark for a local flood. You could just travel out of the area before the flood hit. This was clearly a global flood.
“all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it”? That ain’t local. Besides, if everything were thoroughly rotten, why would God kill just some humans and some animals, as a local flood would? It makes no sense.
If the flood were local, you wouldn’t need two of each. The flooded area would get repopulated by creatures from the surrounding unflooded areas. You wouldn’t need an ark in the first place, as I already pointed out, and if you did build an ark you would only need to carry the creatures that were unique to the flooded area.
On the other hand, if the flood were global — and in the author’s mind, it obviously was — then you would need two of each creature.
Every kind. Not just the local ones.
Is it sinking in?
To be continued…
Continued from previous comment:
In case you didn’t get it the first twenty times.
Mt. Ararat is more than 16,000 feet high. The author says that the water rose higher than “all the high mountains under the entire heavens”. Does that sound like a local flood to you? If so, what are you smoking?
Clearly God was talking about a global flood. It’s “all living creatures”, and the promise wouldn’t make sense if the flood had been local. There have been thousands of local floods since then; God would be violating his promise left and right. Again, the flood was obviously global.
There have been plenty of local floods since then. God was talking about a global flood that destroyed all life.
It couldn’t be clearer. This author was talking about a global flood.
Unbelievable. You twist someone else’s words to fit your desired interpretation, despite them clearly saying the opposite of what you claim!
And you wonder why your “interpretations” of the bible are challenged…
Mung,
Your claim directly contradicted what Weinberg actually said. “With or without it you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things.” Nothing there suggests that he believes religion is required for good and evil. Quite the opposite.
Kantian Naturalist,
I find myself in agreement with you. Please stop that. It’s a conversation killer.
@Keiths
Yes, we all know it says “all” and “every”. But how can you be sure it’s used like a definitive quantifier in predicate logic and not more like “as far as can be reasonably determined” as it is used in common speech?
All in all, do you find the Bible using predicate logic or do you find it more often using poetic metaphors, hyperboles, analogies, parables? I don’t find it using predicate logic AT ALL!
Also, pay closer attention to this bit, “21 Every living thing that moved on land perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. 22 Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. 23 Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark.”
The last sentence implies everything died except those in the ark. By common sense we know fish could not have died. The list of creatures before the last sentence – logically enough – doesn’t include fish, so it implies fish did not have to die. Therefore the last sentence is not as literal and absolute as literalists want it to be and we would be at liberty to conjecture what else could have survived besides fish. However, in my point of view it’s a useless conjecture, because literal meaning is the least important.
I wasn’t aware I was making that confusion, or even in danger of doing so. I was quite clear, I thought, in distinguishing between the distinction that I’m drawing here and the fact that many people of faith would not want to draw that distinction.
I’m kind of unsophisticaed.
I draw a line between vegans and people who want to outlaw meat. Between people of faith and people of dominion.
However, if someone enters the fray on an internet forum, I have no qualms about opposing ideas I think are stupid. No one who voluntarily enters a discussion gets a politeness ticket. And last time I looked, no one outside a classroom is required to read anything he or she finds offensive.
I’m not setting up a prohibition against their expressing their beliefs, but rather that believers have an ethical obligation to express their beliefs in terms that are reasonably acceptable by all if they intend for their beliefs to be taken as justifying policies that are normatively binding on all. That’s all I’ve been saying, as far as the ethical obligation of democratic citizenship goes.
Now, my own way of dealing with the public/private distinction is to distinguish between assertoric and disclosive language. I can happily acknowledge that this distinction works for me in large part because it is consistent with the tradition of Reform Judaism — though I am getting this distinction from Charles Taylor, who is a theologically liberal Catholic (as well as being strongly left-wing politically). This distinction is my way of articulating a spirituality that is consistent with secularism.
The metaphysical assertion per se is (mostly) harmless; the normative violence comes in only when when believes fail to express their beliefs in terms that are reasonably acceptable by all, if they intend for their beliefs to be taken as justifying policies that are normatively binding on all. I say mostly harmless because metaphysics can become an ideological rationalization for normative violence (as we can learn from Spinoza, among many others)!
You have been also very clear about that Judaism is, in your opinion, an orthopraxis rather than orthodoxy. Since there still are core tenets of belief in Judaism, just like in any other religion, it’s pretty hard to figure out why your opinion matters. It would make sense to describe Judaism as it actually is, not as you want it to be.
Othhopraxis is a new word for me. I’d be curious to know why orthopractors think right practice is important, and whether it is undesirable to be heteropractic.
I happen to like classical Christian music, and I am occasionally entertained by religious rituals. I think theater is a good thing (in the same sense that good art is good art, and good food is good food). Is that the kind of goodness we are talking about? An aesthetic goodness?
Your opinion evolved in response to geology finding evidence contrary to the global flood. Prior to Hutton et al, the consensus was that there was a global flood.
After the fact revisionism is intellectually dishonest, particularly when dealing with revealed history.
Science also revises its models, but in the case of science, nothing is revealed. Science is constructed and invented. there is no inconsistency in revising and improving inventions.
There would be no problem with revising and improving religion, were it constructed rather than revealed.
The idea that Judaism (and Islam) are orthopraxic rather than orthodox isn’t some crazy idea that I made up. It is supported by some scholars of Judaism (for a rough overview, see here) and is nicely developed by Idit Dobbs-Weinstein in her Spinoza’s Critique of Religion and Its Heirs.
The point isn’t that Judaism isn’t solely orthopraxic, but that creeds play a very limited role in Judaism. Jewish life is centered on obeying the commandments or mitzvot, which is to say it is about conduct. Assertions about the nature of reality do play some role, of course, because belief and action can’t be wholly separated — but it isn’t a creedal religion. There’s no analogue to the Apostolic Creed or Nicene Creed to determine who does and doesn’t count as a member of the Jewish community.