Revelations and criteria for holy scriptures

Introduction

Many religions of modern and past times rely on so called holy scriptures, revelations of prophets which are supposed to have come directly from their deity, semi-god or what ever these followers worship.

In general for all these scriptures we get the definition of the followers that they are made for all mankind and for all time. This is an important statement as it perhaps will clearify some apologetics away.

In this essay I will try to deal with revelations concerning how one could or should judge them for their correctness. Also i will briefly go into some thinking about the surrounding situations for a revelation that should be met in order to give good evidence for ist origin.

Surounding Situation

The question that arises often is if there are surrounding factors like time, language or other things that give hints or evidences as to the value of revelations. In case of locally valid revelations, or revelations that are only valid for a special time period and supposed to be later „replaced“ these factors are mostly only of minor interest. However since we do not find any religion which explicitly states that ist not valid for all time or people, but rather the contrary we must have a look at factors which a common mind should ask for. We will therefore just for a moment assume ourselves to be in the role of God confronted with the problem of giving the people a revelation in a way that it will not only be accepted by them, but also by later generations.

Way of revelation

The way of the revelation is how the revelation reaches (not only) the prophet but also the population which should accept it. In many (if not all) religions we find that there was one man or women that received the revelation by God. These Prophets were in all religions alone at the time of revelation, some in dire needs, others in mediation or during their daily work. Almost all religions ascribe the selection of a prophet to the fact that he was the most suitable man for the task, that his character and inner strength made God select him.

Now considering ourselves as God, knowing all aspects of all humans and of course also of the prophet we could ask ourselves how to give the message to the people. We must keep in mind all the time that if we make a revelation for all time it is important that also people of later generations have no doubt about what really happened. Why then would we talk to the prophet alone all the time ? Would it not be a better way to announce ourselves publicly several times to give all people not only the chance but also the certainty that God is speaking to his prophet ? And would we not choose (as in case of many religions) not a different place and time to talk to the prophet then in the time when he for example is thirsdy and ready to die in the desert, so that later generations couldnt assume he was hallucinating ? Obviously we would at least at the start use some means to make it clear to everybody that it is really us speaking and choosing the prophet.

We would take care that nobody could mix him up with some mad or selfish person.

Now as said earlier people tend to forget and therefore it does make sense to not only give a revelation to a prophet but during this procedure it would be advicable to create something which definetly can’t be explained but by godly power. I am not refering to such things as creation of earth or so as this is a thing there are enough founded theories which do not include a God. I rather suggest for example things like a building on mars with a copy of the holy scripture, or a repeated natural effect which for example writes the name of God in the sky all x years etc. etc. Things that always support the belief BEFORE humans reach the knowledge to copy these effects.

By means of this nobody could doubt that God existed or at least a higher being.

Place of revelation

Concidering the place of revelation we find several possibilities. Now as we will remember we want a religion for all humanity and all times. We also want this religion to be evident as truth. There would be several aproaches for this. One could be to reveal the religion in one part of the world and then make that tribe or nation expand in the world, so that every part of the world gets it. This is interestingly the ONLY way revelations were made so far. However it contains some flaws in efficiency and morality. First of all when you remember the above paragraphs you will see that by this method we are not able to initially convince all of the religion. People in other countries would have to be converted and they would have it harder to believe the religion then those who saw our direct „light“. This would be morally questionable as we would have to judge their disbelief with the same measure as the disbelief of the people in the „source country“ yet the foreigners have a harder task to believe. Secondly it would be morally bad because by „starting“ the thing in one country we would let other countries continue with disbelief for as long as it takes to spread the religion to them. Also we would encourage wars, as of course rival religions tend to fight when it comes to who is correct and who is not.

The better way to make a revelation would be to make it with several prophets at different locations all over the planet at the same time. As God this shouldnt be too difficult a task. If we also remember to preserve the holy scriptures then when these cultures meet they should see that only one religion was taught to them all, thus God respected all humanity the same and didnt prefer some tribe (as jews or muslims for example claim).

Of course there is also the possibility of a localized revelation provided that all humans can see it (which then would be something possible in modern times (or even later) for example when TV and radio are capable of transmitting the event to all humans.

Text of revelation

This topic will be discussed in the chapter about Qualities of holy scriptures

Language of revelation

When turning to the language we face several problems.

Change of language over time

In order to make our revelation everlasting we should make it clear that the language in which the revelation was given will not change. This is however very improbable as all languages have changed to a certain degree. There are three possibilities now of how to solve this problem.

1.        Preservation of the language by ordering the people to keep the language and or make them study the old language if they invent a new one.

2.        Periodic repetitions of revelations so that in later days the same revelation „materialises“ in the new language

3.        Making a „translatable“ which by translation will not be corrupted

Which language to choose

Basically when we are assuming that we use a global revelation method like described above, we would use every language. Ordering our followers not to change the script they would when meeting other cultures see that they all have the same script correctly translated in their language. It would also guarantee that the people believed in us, since it would not be explainable how all cultures which are not connected at the start have the same revelation at the same time.

If we use the method of localized revelation then either we would have to use a language that is spoken everywhere in the world (see the time chapter), or we would have to use a rather simple language which leaves nearly no room for misinterpretation by foreigners. We will come to this in the chapter misunderstandability.

Time of revelation

Now a final criteria for a revelation would also be the time. Of course it would be amoral to let people live without revelations, so we would have to start very soon with them. However the time for a final, everlasting revelation for all humanity cant be in the earliest ages. This is for several reasons. It would be logic to give people revelations from the start, so that they are not mislead. Of course one could also think of a God who wants the people to reach a certain level of society before giving them a revelation. Now in the case of a primitive culture it would be best to give localized and timelimited revelations and to clearly express the limitedness of them, so people wouldnt go to far astray. It would not be apropriate to give them the „everlasting absolute scripture“ directly as they would understand so few of it that perhaps they wouldnt believe it even if we made some „special effects“. Obviously the time for a final revelation is when humans are capable to understand the deeper philosophy of God and the world. Also as said above it would be better to make the revelation at a time when contacts between the different cultures is established and people can reach all parts of the world. Only then can they not only apreciate God, they can also get better and more accurate information about the world then the cultures of former times.

Conclusion

Basically if we would assume to be God it would be good to use one of the two following methods for our final revelation:

1.        A global revelation with propets all over the world, made in several languages and ordered not to change.

2.        A local revelation (made global by the technology of humans), made in one language simple and understood by all humans.

Of course for both types we need the „special effects“ of  described in Way of revelation. The first path had the advantage of reassuring the people that they are correct every time they meet another tribe or culture, but at the disadvantage that the „knowledge“ we could tranfer to these people was more limited due to the more primitive status of development. The second method had the advantage that all humanity (or nearly all) would be reached at once, with a message clearly understood by everyone. Also the whole globe would be witness to this.

Qualities of a holy scripture

Considering the problem of the way we would reveal our holy scripture solved, we should now turn to what factors make a good revelation, once that is believed in for all time.

Semantic Context

It is very important to have correct semantics in the scripture. There mustnt be a doubt as to the meaning of any given verse or phrase. In this case it is extremely important to make sure for example which references are to be taken literally and which only as an imaginary comparrison or example. The best would be to use only literal meaning simply because the views people have change over time, just as culture itself changes.

Logical Context

It is very important to make the text in such a language that logically there are no contradictions. In the case of an text which is to be taken literally this is a must. If parts of the text should be used interpretative or as examples or images then logical cantradictions can occur, however in these cases it is important to make clear that the text is not to be taken literally.

Scientific Context

Scientific content if needed at all has to be accurate, not only for the time the revelation occurs but also for later times. Especially important is here the fact that people should not be confronted with interpretable texts, which can be laid out as wished later, but rather with detailed and conclusive information. Also it would be a good sign to put in some scientific facts that will only be revealed DUE to the revelation (not only after it), not known before.

Misunderstandability

Misunderstandability is related to the logical, scientific and semantic context. In order for a scripture to be regarded as holy by all humans (or lets say most) it should be nearly impossible to misunderstand it. For example in many scriptures you will find phrases that do contradict clearly the scientific evidences of today, but not those of the former days. Scholars of these religions tend to say then that the phrases are not supposed to be taken literally. Of course this may be true, but a true revelation would avoid these problems as obviously some people will believe the scholars while others wont. So in the scripture God would make sure to mark clearly all passages not ment literally or scientifically. There should be no contradiction in the texts if you take all literal that is marked literal, and it should be clear that the rest is not to be taken as fact, but as example.

Of course depending on the „development“ of the culture we could also say that all should be ment literally. There is no need to explain things via abstract and logically contradicting examples if the people are already knowledgable enough to understand concrete examples.

Another important thing about the misunderstandability is the language. Provided that there are several languages it of course is difficult to translate a text accurately into another language. So when making a scripture we would have to take that into account. Quite often for example the argument is made by muslims that arabic language was choosen because of ist richness. Some words have more then 9 meanings. However concerning the holy revelation this is a KO criteria. Using a complex and rich language with many meanings for a word would only lead to exactly the situation we face in many debates at the moment, namely people claiming there are contradictions in the scriptures and others saying that the translaters used the wrong word in the translation and thus made an error. This problem however does also occur in the countries in which the language is spoken as it is quite impossible for a normal person to keep in mind every meaning of every word of that language. So he will of course also do the error of using a meaning of a word that is not ment in this context. This would however be not a sign of a good scripture. The semantic context would be lost. A real holy scripture would use the least common ground for the text. Either it would take a language rich, but with only few meanings of a word, so that translation brings no problem or in the case of several revelations in different languages this problem would be solved by comparing the languages and therefore deducing the correct one out of the different linguistic versions of the scripture.

Selfexplanatory

A scripture that needs explanatory books, which for example explain the meaning of verses and phrases is not likely to be accepted as a real revelation. If God cant make his words clear then obviously he cant be God. If the revelation contains passages only known if one understands the „social“ surroundings and the time of revelation then obviously it cant be universal. Therefore a holy scripture would have to be able to teach the follower all from itself.

Revelation of the unknown

As said it is important to show the people that the revelation is directly from God and not the ideas of a human we already mentioned several „special effects“ to convince the people of that time that it is so. However as people tend to forget and doubt it is clearly a good idea to put into the book CLEAR facts that can`t be known at that time. And this has to be done in a way that clearly shows that the information of this phrase will not be understood untill later. In todays scriptures many so called scientific facts are „hidden“ and „only recently“ revealed. However these do not meet the requirements for several reasons:

1.        People of different times interpreted these phrases differently, so they were not marked as „later to be understood".

2.        Non of these claims of knowledge really stands the question if this was not known at this time.

3.        Neither of the refered verses is clear in itself that it is a scientific revelation. Rather they are interpretable texts which could mean many things.

All this has to be avoided.

An example of a bad and a good verse for this can be given below:

1.        And we sent down Iron, in which is Great might, as well as many benefits for mankind. (Qur’an 57-25). This verse is claimed by some sites of muslim content to be a revelation of the scientific fact that iron is the most common material in the universe and that „In calculating the energy required to form one atom of iron, it was found to be about four times as much as the energy of the entire solar system“.
We will not comment about the correctness of the scientific „facts“ presented by the site. What we will rather comment about is if this would pass as a god given scientific revelation. Quite obviously it is possible (and many people do this) to interpret the verse in other ways. One could for example consider the importance of iron at the time of revelation and conclude that this is only an example used to demonstrate Gods power by showing the people something they can understand. And the importance of iron at that time is therefore an image used to bring the message of the power of God to the people. This verse is clearly interpretable and therefore not a guaranteed revelation of the unknown.

2.        Lets suppose the bible, or the torah or the quran had made the following statement:
“And LATER you will realise how stars which are but suns collapse and a black hole will be created there which even absorbs light.“
This could be marked with a SR (Scientific revelation), but even if not this is CLEARLY something not known to the people at that time and it clearly is true, without any need for interpretation. Nobody could deny the fact that this was not known at the time. The only excuse one could make would be that it was by chance that this is true, but originally it was ment as an image to show the power of god. This however is very improbable because of the „LATER you will REALISE“ and of course because in the scripture you will find many such verses, so that the chance for these verses to all happen per accident would be very small.

Conclusion

As we see the problems of writing a holy script are quite a few. We can see that many of the scriptures ( I tend to say all) do not meet the standards of above criteria. It is quite evident that humans wrote that or God did not bother to write a text that is comprehensible and clear for all people that have a brain. On the other hand a person of todays world who could travel back in time would be able to produce such a text that would meet the criteria (at least till our time and his knowledge is by later scientists prooven wrong). But if a man of our days could be able to lure the people of ancient times into believeing him by making a scripture which clearly shows facts not known at former times, then why would God not be able to do that in a better way?

Final Remarks of some inconclusive claims and „a-rounds“

The contradiction debate

Everywhere in the internet and in the literature, TV and radio you will find contradiction debates between followers of different religions. One very often found is the debate between Islam and Christianity ( in the net found for example with www.answering-islam.org.uk for the christian side and http://www.islamicawareness.com ). All these sites keep themselves occupied with attacks against the other religions scripture. Logical context, scientific facts, errors and contradictions of the other religions book are all the time shown and rebutted. Some of these essays and articles are more professional then the others. Some logical contraditions are defended by the semantics, saying this was never ment in a scientific or logical way. Others are explained by the richness of the language and a misunderstanding of the reader.

Yet they all seem to be blind to the fundamental fact about their scriptures. Since obviously these „misunderstandings“ are there and possible and since logical contradictions do occur simple for the fact that no scripture clearly marks the difference between literal passages and „stories“ we can easily see that they dont fullfill the requirements we set above. In other words the mere fact that there is so much „uncertainty“ concerning these matters in the books depending on who you ask and what religion you have it is clearly evident that it is very improbable for any of them to be a holy scripture.

Tricks of religions around the scripture criterias

The specialness of the prophet

Many theists argue that the prophet was special and therefore got the revelation personally. And since he was better then the rest he was the only one deserving to get it directly or to speak to his God. Others say that special conditions had to be met in order to communicate with God, for example the near death in the desert. However these ideas are rather wondrous. If as most claim God gave the revelation to make himself known, then the best and most efficient way would have been to show himself in a way and at a time at which there cant be any other explanation and so that even in later times people find it very hard not to believe in the evidence. Of course theists say he showed himself to some or made miracles, yet if we look for these we do not find any evidences or lasting results of these things except for in the scriptures. So we would have to believe the scripture first to accept evidence therin. This is rather paradox. Also given the situatin that so many imposters walk around and many do not believe in prophet xyz because of that God would have easily forseen that choosing someone and only communicating with him without any external reference is rather chancy if you want all the people to believe.

Belief in the unseen

Many religions require the belief in the unseen. Belief for example that the prophet talked to God or an angel or whatever directly. It is of course clear (or at least it should be) that we humans will never be able to see absolutly all that is. Of course we will also never understand God as a whole in case he exists or the universe. However as humans God gave us reason and ration and the ability to think (which by the way a lot of animals have in a different level also). Now how reasonable is it for a God who knows all and is all powerfull and gave us a brain to require from us not to use it in cases where it is rather simple for him. Why should he tell us to believe in the unseen when we would have been able to understand it. Since humans are doubtful beings it would be better had God for example spoken to the prophet directly or through a being not found anywhere on the planet. Or as mentioned above to use some „special effects“. Our reasonable mind clearly suggests that all religions are rather hoaxes then truth, simply because we have seen to many imposters and they dont really differ from the „established“ religions except that the prophets of those are long dead and the „ideology“ has set into the minds of the people. But we have no clue as to if this really is correct. To the contrary we even think it is wrong.

Opening the heart and blindness

It can be found in nearly every religion:
“Those that believe have their heart opened by God while those that dont have their heart ceiled. God has made them blind or they are blind. There are presented with proofs yet they dont believe.“

Interestingly every religion doesnt say so only to atheists but also to followers of another religion. But basically this is even more a hint that the religion is not based on true revelation. First of all if there really were good proofs then people would not disbelieve it. Just suppose that christianity was correct and the scripture and teaching would not leave any doubt about that. There were proofs that really could be understood and not doubted. If we leave out the mad, then even the most evil person would surely believe the revelation. He might perhaps still be evil, but he wouldnt doubt it. Considering the penalty he would probably even follow it.

But the fact is different. Obviously there are intelligent people all around the world which all have different religions. And obviously most of these intelligent people do NOT change the religion. So it can be concluded that the proofs in the revelations are simply not good enough. Of course scholars will say that they didnt put enough effort into learning it or that they were not taught correctly but one can of course ask then how much effort should be needed to teach the obvious?

Another interesting question is why people that are ordered to believe in the unseen and ordered to accept things which (for others) are irrational should be considered open hearted and seeing, while those which use their brain and dont accept everything just as simple are considered blind. What God would use this terminology, or even allow that?

Chain of revelations

Some Theists argue that God gave one complete religion which was later changed by humans, so he was forced (others say as a sign of his grace) to make the „original“ revelation again. Only that this time he ordered the people not to change it.  By this they want to avoid the morality problem of a God giving a revelation only after some time and therefore condemming all before that time to hell. Also they try to explain by this how it comes that so many revelations are present. This is a rather silly argument. If we were God why would we not forsee this ? And why would the people this time not change the revelation while all others did if it was the same ?