Being
an unbeliever is rough business these days. As much as gays and lesbians are
under attack in this day and age, it is still easier for a GLBT candidate to be
elected to office, than it is for an atheist: I know of no “outed” atheist in
any major office in the country, except Kyrsten Sinema. Discrimination against
unbelievers is the one form of bigotry that will still be acceptable long after
America has embraced equality for GLBT families.
So imagine how hard it must have been a century ago, during the Victorian age, when America was undergoing a religious revival and preachers were stepping deep into the political arena to grapple with issues such as slavery, prohibition and national reform.
Into this morass of religious fervor waded a man named Bob Ingersoll.
Ingersoll was the last man anyone would have expected to be a “free thinker”. His father was a preacher who was active in the anti-slavery movement. Ingersoll led troops in the Civil War and then worked primarily as a lawyer, rising to the post of Illinois Attorney General; in an age when writing and speaking skills were prized, he excelled at both, commanding huge fees for his appearances and winning praise even from fellow word-mongers like Mark Twain. His speech nominating James Blaine for president was a landmark in oratory, a model for future speakers such as Franklin Roosevelt.
But he had a skeleton in his closet. Angered by the religious hardliners who hounded his father because his religious views weren’t extreme enough, Bob Ingersoll became an unbeliever. Republicans in Illinois liked him so much they wanted him to run for governor – provided he shut up about his religious views. He refused. Instead he led the golden age of Free Thought in the 19th century. His speeches veered more and more into the realm of atheistic and agnostic belief, or more accurately into attacks on organized religion and the Bible. All across the country ministers attacked him and newspapers condemned him. Throughout his career he cheerfully and politely shot down the arguments against him and continued to collect fat speaking fees.
And, happily, he wrote a lot of his stuff down. Mountains of it. A thousand pages or more. Since it would be problematic for the casual observer to climb into such an intimidating mound of philosophical wisdom, I have done it instead, and distilled the essence of his work into something more handy and practical for you to enjoy. Or rage against.
If you want to look at the original materials, the most promising articles include About the Holy Bible; Some Mistakes of Moses; the two articles on blasphemy, namely the Reynolds and Comegys articles; the debates with Black, Field and Gladstone; Divided Faith; Great Infidels; Heretics and Heresies; How To Be Saved; Should Infidels Send Their Children to Sunday School?; A Few Reasons for Doubting the Inspiration of the Bible; Orthodoxy; the second Rome Or Reason; and the fifth Talmadge article. They were organized by a man named Emmett Fields and can be found on the site below.
http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/robert_ingersoll/
The article is divided into six sections. In the GOD’S BOOK section, Ingersoll says that the Bible consists of wisdom and morality which other, more developed cultures had already discovered, and original writings which were clearly the work of primitive men rather than God; that no one knows who really wrote the books of the Bible, and that there are no true eyewitness accounts of Jesus’ life; that the stories of the resurrection and ascension are muddled and suspicious, with no witnesses except the faithful; and that the incidents in Eden were all Jehovah’s fault. He wondered why the miracles of the Bible were ignored by so many, from the Egyptians to the Romans, and why three gospels say nothing about Jesus’ divinity.
In GOD’S WORK, Ingersoll railed against the Biblical Jehovah, cruel, breaking promises, mistreating women, and making a total mess of the world he created and the people he put in it; he wondered why both Jehovah and Jesus failed to explain critical questions of faith, and why Jehovah only gave the Bible to one tiny community. He also condemned the organized religions, destructive, parasitic and cruel, slowing the advance of humanity while other cultures were leading mankind forward.
In HELL AND SALVATION, Ingersoll condemned the terrifying scheme wherein a majority of the people Jehovah created were doomed to eternal hellfire regardless of how moral their lives had been, strictly on the basis of belief, a doctrine which does not appear at all in the Old Testament or in three of the four gospels; he was appalled at the notion that people could cheerily enter the pearly gates and ignore the fact that their loved ones were burning in hell forever.
In MORALITY, Ingersoll insisted that a faith rooted in so much Old-Testament cruelty was not a necessary guide for morality, and that the faith had a shoddy track record of mistreating women and brainwashing children. He ridiculed the inefficacy of prayer and martyrdom.
In PROGRESS, Ingersoll celebrated the fact that Christianity was at least growing and progressing, although not quickly enough, and only because the forces of science and society were compelling change.
In REASON, Ingersoll thought it was high time that humanity resisted Christianity’s effort to stifle dissent and force people to think alike, and begin challenging the faith and the Bible, particularly the more nonsensical passages. He wanted less theology in the world, and more logic and science. He teetered between agnosticism and atheism but defend his beliefs, whatever they were, with great power.
So imagine how hard it must have been a century ago, during the Victorian age, when America was undergoing a religious revival and preachers were stepping deep into the political arena to grapple with issues such as slavery, prohibition and national reform.
Into this morass of religious fervor waded a man named Bob Ingersoll.
Ingersoll was the last man anyone would have expected to be a “free thinker”. His father was a preacher who was active in the anti-slavery movement. Ingersoll led troops in the Civil War and then worked primarily as a lawyer, rising to the post of Illinois Attorney General; in an age when writing and speaking skills were prized, he excelled at both, commanding huge fees for his appearances and winning praise even from fellow word-mongers like Mark Twain. His speech nominating James Blaine for president was a landmark in oratory, a model for future speakers such as Franklin Roosevelt.
But he had a skeleton in his closet. Angered by the religious hardliners who hounded his father because his religious views weren’t extreme enough, Bob Ingersoll became an unbeliever. Republicans in Illinois liked him so much they wanted him to run for governor – provided he shut up about his religious views. He refused. Instead he led the golden age of Free Thought in the 19th century. His speeches veered more and more into the realm of atheistic and agnostic belief, or more accurately into attacks on organized religion and the Bible. All across the country ministers attacked him and newspapers condemned him. Throughout his career he cheerfully and politely shot down the arguments against him and continued to collect fat speaking fees.
And, happily, he wrote a lot of his stuff down. Mountains of it. A thousand pages or more. Since it would be problematic for the casual observer to climb into such an intimidating mound of philosophical wisdom, I have done it instead, and distilled the essence of his work into something more handy and practical for you to enjoy. Or rage against.
If you want to look at the original materials, the most promising articles include About the Holy Bible; Some Mistakes of Moses; the two articles on blasphemy, namely the Reynolds and Comegys articles; the debates with Black, Field and Gladstone; Divided Faith; Great Infidels; Heretics and Heresies; How To Be Saved; Should Infidels Send Their Children to Sunday School?; A Few Reasons for Doubting the Inspiration of the Bible; Orthodoxy; the second Rome Or Reason; and the fifth Talmadge article. They were organized by a man named Emmett Fields and can be found on the site below.
http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/robert_ingersoll/
The article is divided into six sections. In the GOD’S BOOK section, Ingersoll says that the Bible consists of wisdom and morality which other, more developed cultures had already discovered, and original writings which were clearly the work of primitive men rather than God; that no one knows who really wrote the books of the Bible, and that there are no true eyewitness accounts of Jesus’ life; that the stories of the resurrection and ascension are muddled and suspicious, with no witnesses except the faithful; and that the incidents in Eden were all Jehovah’s fault. He wondered why the miracles of the Bible were ignored by so many, from the Egyptians to the Romans, and why three gospels say nothing about Jesus’ divinity.
In GOD’S WORK, Ingersoll railed against the Biblical Jehovah, cruel, breaking promises, mistreating women, and making a total mess of the world he created and the people he put in it; he wondered why both Jehovah and Jesus failed to explain critical questions of faith, and why Jehovah only gave the Bible to one tiny community. He also condemned the organized religions, destructive, parasitic and cruel, slowing the advance of humanity while other cultures were leading mankind forward.
In HELL AND SALVATION, Ingersoll condemned the terrifying scheme wherein a majority of the people Jehovah created were doomed to eternal hellfire regardless of how moral their lives had been, strictly on the basis of belief, a doctrine which does not appear at all in the Old Testament or in three of the four gospels; he was appalled at the notion that people could cheerily enter the pearly gates and ignore the fact that their loved ones were burning in hell forever.
In MORALITY, Ingersoll insisted that a faith rooted in so much Old-Testament cruelty was not a necessary guide for morality, and that the faith had a shoddy track record of mistreating women and brainwashing children. He ridiculed the inefficacy of prayer and martyrdom.
In PROGRESS, Ingersoll celebrated the fact that Christianity was at least growing and progressing, although not quickly enough, and only because the forces of science and society were compelling change.
In REASON, Ingersoll thought it was high time that humanity resisted Christianity’s effort to stifle dissent and force people to think alike, and begin challenging the faith and the Bible, particularly the more nonsensical passages. He wanted less theology in the world, and more logic and science. He teetered between agnosticism and atheism but defend his beliefs, whatever they were, with great power.
