richard_dawkins_-_the_god_delusion

92 THE GOD DELUSION
mass lie. Or that history is mistaken in recording that seventy
thousand people claimed to see the sun dance. Or that they all
simultaneously saw a mirage (they had been persuaded to stare at
the sun, which can't have done much for their eyesight). But any of
those apparent improbabilities is far more probable than the alternative:
that the Earth was suddenly yanked sideways in its orbit,
and the solar system destroyed, with nobody outside Fatima
noticing. I mean, Portugal is not that isolated.*
That is really all that needs to be said about personal
'experiences' of gods or other religious phenomena. If you've had
such an experience, you may well find yourself believing firmly that
it was real. But don't expect the rest of us to take your word for it,
especially if we have the slightest familiarity with the brain and its
powerful workings.
THE ARGUMENT FROM SCRIPTURE
There are still some people who are persuaded by scriptural
evidence to believe in God. A common argument, attributed among
others to C. S. Lewis (who should have known better), states that,
since Jesus claimed to be the Son of God, he must have been either
right or else insane or a liar: 'Mad, Bad or God'. Or, with artless
alliteration, 'Lunatic, Liar or Lord'. The historical evidence that
Jesus claimed any sort of divine status is minimal. But even if that
evidence were good, the trilemma on offer would be ludicrously
inadequate. A fourth possibility, almost too obvious to need
mentioning, is that Jesus was honestly mistaken. Plenty of people
are. In any case, as I said, there is no good historical evidence that
he ever thought he was divine.
The fact that something is written down is persuasive to people
not used to asking questions like: 'Who wrote it, and when?' 'How
did they know what to write?' 'Did they, in their time, really mean
what we, in our time, understand them to be saying?' 'Were they
unbiased observers, or did they have an agenda that coloured their
writing?' Ever since the nineteenth century, scholarly theologians
have made an overwhelming case that the gospels are not reliable
* Although admittedly my wife's parents once stayed in a Paris hotel called the
Hotel de I'Univers et du Portugal.