ext_171624 ([identity profile] qatar.livejournal.com) wrote in [personal profile] qatarperegrine 2008-04-14 06:22 am (UTC)

Agreed. :-) Too much of it is just irritating and frustrating to read for me to recommend it unreservedly.

My favorite part of The God Delusion is probably this paragraph, which I think succinctly sums up something I struggled with for a long time:
"Which religion, anyway? The one in which we happen to have been brought up? To which chapter, then, of which book of the Bible should we turn - for they are far from unanimous and some of them are odious by any reasonable standards. How many literalists have read enough of the Bible to know that the death penalty is prescribed for adultery, for gathering sticks on the sabbath and for cheeking your parents? If we reject Deuteronomy and Leviticus (as all enlightened moderns do), by what criteria do we then decide which of religion's moral values to accept? Or should we pick and choose among all the world's religions until we find one whose moral teaching suits us? If so, again we must ask, by what criterion do we choose? And if we have independent criteria for choosing among religious moralities, why not cut out the middle man and go straight for the moral choice without the religion?"

Post a comment in response:

This account has disabled anonymous posting.
If you don't have an account you can create one now.
HTML doesn't work in the subject.
More info about formatting