Religious Illiteracy: Yes it's a thing
In this article, I will be talking about the phenomenon of religious illiteracy that is present in the United States. However, this issue is present in many other places not just the United States. Simply put many people don't know very much about the origins and issues with the history of their religion and their religion's sacred text. This then causes mainstream readers and uninformed readers to fall into one of two categories. The first are gullible readers who are persuaded by sensationalist writers. These writers are not scholars and often present things to cause controversy. We all know the press loves controversy. The second category are those who choose to not educate themselves on their religions history. I will be discussing both of these categories in this article.
The above image is of the Council of Nicaea that happened in the year 325 A.D. Because of sensationalist and uneducated claims this council has become an infamous topic. Very few people know what actually happened during this council. Constantine called this council to address the Arian controversy that was affecting the Roman empire at this time. A bishop named Arius, was promoting a view that Jesus was a created being and not co-eternal or co-equal with God. Alexander of Alexandria was the opposing bishop who opposed Arius and promoted that view that Jesus was co-equal and co-eternal with God. Constantine called the council to settle the issue of Christ's identity with God. A overwhelming majority of the bishops sided with Alexander and thus this was the church's first universal declaration that Jesus was the divine son of God who was also God.
The problem is that authors like Dan Brown promote fiction about what this council was all about. Brown insists that it was a close vote, it was not. Brown asserts that before the council Christians only saw Jesus as a mortal man, this is also false. Others who seek to downplay Christianity, like Islamic preacher Yusuf Estes, assert that the books of the Bible and verses of the Bible were permanently changed at this council. Both of these claims are false and have no basis in history. Now I'm not promoting Christianity in this article, just exposing ignorance. The truth is that the list of accepted New Testament books was not decided at Nicaea and verses of the Bible were not changed at Nicaea. Sensationalists authors claim this, and many ignorant people spout out this claim without researching church history. On the other side, many others don't even study the Council of Nicaea or even know what it was about. If you don't believe me ask any random Christian what the Council of Nicaea was and see if they can tell you.
That brings us to the next topic and that is the Canon of the New Testament. This refers to the list of books that were accepted into what eventually became the Christian New Testament. The uneducated believers simply assume the church fathers got the correct books down. Many of them are not even aware of the existence of other writings that didn't make it into the New Testament. Examples include: The Gospel of the Egyptians, The Gospel of Judas and the Shepard of Hermas. Therefore we have two problems with the issue of other gospels and letters that weren't accepted. On the one hand they are ignored or simply dismissed, and the others claim that there were hundreds or thousands of Gospels and the Christians simply cherry picked the Gospels and letters to include in the Bible. This claim is also false. While the NT canon didn't fall from heaven, it also was rooted in a historic process. From documents such as Muratorian fragment, scholars can tell there was a list in the early church of accepted works. The four canonical gospels, Paul's letters and 1 and 2 John were the first to be accepted. While other works like Revelation and James took longer. There were also other issues why other books were rejected, you simply need to compare them to see the difference. So with the canon we have people who ignore and others who exaggerate.
The Old Testament or Hebrew Bible poses some serious problems for Christians and Jews. It certainty is hard, as rational human beings, to accept everything that this book says. So many dismiss it as a fairy tale while others believe every word. The Exodus is an intriguing example because there is no archaeological or historical evidence that this event ever happened. I learned this when I was a student at a seminary school. For those who don't know, seminary is a school where people preachers and pastors. However, it is also where you learn about the academic study of the Bible. However, I don't think the issue is whether or not this was actually happened. The writers of the Exodus were creating a theology-based narrative and not a literal history which explains the historical problems. Additionally, I also learned that the prophets in the Hebrew scriptures were more like social commentators and not crystal ball gazers. There are many historical problems with the Hebrew scriptures that many people don't know about.
Our last topic will be about the Quran. In my previous article, I talked about the need for an Islamic reformation. Many Muslims are unaware of textual differences in the text of the Quran. They are also unaware of the similarities between Zoroastrianism and Islam. The truth is the Caliph Uthman burned variant readings of the Quran. Did we know he choose the right readings? It's impossible to say.
I'm not calling for an end to religion simply just an end to ignorance. It is my desire to see everyone seeking out the truth so that religious illiteracy won't be an issue anymore. Thanks for reading.