The Logic of Christianity 6: WHODUNNIT?

If the God of Logic exists—that is, an “agent” who “acts” in forming and animating the universe in “logical order,” using “rational communication,” in the process of accomplishing the personal “motives” of achieving “self-actualization” and developing “social” relationships—who is this God? The board game Clue® allows one to win that game, partly, by identifying all of the potential suspects and systematically eliminating each one until one has come up with the correct “agent” who “killed Mr. Boddy.” Like any good murder mystery novel, film, or television show in which the suspects are identified, scrutinized, and gradually, systematically, eliminated from consideration, we may refer to the game of Clue® as a “Whodunnit” (or, as it is more commonly spelled, “Whodunit”). Although I apologize for the fact that the term “Whodunnit” carries with it the connotation of the “agent” being involved in the commission of a crime (and, certainly, “creating and animating the universe” has not been considered to be a crime by any serious person), the same procedure that is used in Whodunnits may be logically employed for identifying which “god suspect” most logically should be credited with the formation of the universe.

THE LIST OF SUSPECTS The game of Clue® offers a finite list of possible suspects: Miss Scarlett, Colonel Mustard, Mrs. White, Mr. Green, Mrs. Peacock, and Professor Plum. Likewise, we may come up with a finite list of possible “god suspects.” It seems that, since the God we seek to identify uses “rational communication” for the purpose of developing “social” relationships with the only species to whom that God has given the ability to engage in creative “action”—namely, the human—the God we seek to identify should have, at least at some point, “communicated socially” with this human species. Marketing communication professors Moriarty, Mitchell, and Wells correctly point out that “everything communicates” (p. 55), and, as I pointed out in my post entitled The Logic of Christianity 4: “The shepherd-poet-lyricist-singer-turned-king, David, the author of many of the Psalms in the Hebrew Bible cites EMPIRICAL evidence in his poetic proclamations that God was easily detected in the formation of the universe.” This suggests that any objective observer of nature receives some communication from God, but that is not the kind of communication that is required when we suggest that the correct “god suspect” should have, at some point, “communicated socially” with this human species. If this empirical communication were the only form of communication used by the “god suspect,” we might be inclined to agree with the assessment of Albert Einstein which I pointed out in my post entitled The Logic of Christianity 3: “I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me which can be called religious then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our science can reveal it . . . I want to know how God created this world, I am not interested in this or that phenomenon, in the spectrum of this or that element. I want to know His thoughts, the rest are details." Einstein, of course, CAN be wrong on some details. Logically, a God capable of and motivated to communicate socially with a species that that God designed and formed to be capable of similar communicative action would be expected to engage in such social communication. Therefore, an objective thinker might logically conclude that the identity of the correct “god suspect” would be known to mankind, being one of the gods identified by various human cultures throughout history. But who are these gods? The list is still finite, but fairly extensive. [FEEL FREE TO SKIM OVER THE GOD LISTS BELOW TO ARRIVE AT FURTHER COMMENTARY.] If one were to play the GAME OF CLUE with these characters, here is the list of characters you might include in your game:

Our list of “god suspects” includes the following MESOPOTAMIAN GODS (from a list supplied by the Ancient History Encyclopedia http://www.ancient.eu/article/221/ ): ABGAL (aka, Apkallu), Adapa (the first man) Uan-dugga, En-me-duga, En-me-galanna, En-me-buluga, An-enlilda and Utu-abzu, ABSU (aka, Apsu and Abzu), ADAD, Shala, ADRAMELECH, Anamelech, AJA (aka, Aya), AMURRU (aka, Amurru and Martu), Beletseri, ANSHAR, ANTUM, ANU, (aka, An), Antu, ANUNNAKI, ANZU (aka, Zu and Imdugud), ARAZU, ARURU, ASHNAN, ASHUR, BABA (aka, Bau or Bawa), Lagash, BASMU, BEL, BELIT-TSERI, BIRDU, BULL OF HEAVEN (aka, Gugalanna), BULL-MAN, CARA, DAGON (aka, Dagan), DAMU, DAMKINA, DILMUN, DUMUZI, EA/ENKI, ELLIL, EMESH, ENBILULU, ENKIMDU, ENKIDU, ENLIL, ENMESSARA, ENTEN, Enmesh, ERESHKIGAL (aka, IRKALLA), ERRAGAL, ERIDAN, ERRA/IRRA, ESEMTU, ETANA, Balih, ETEMMU, GALLA, Igalima, GARRA (aka, Gerra), GESHTINANNA, GESHTU (aka, Geshtu-e), GIBIL, GILGAMESH (depicted as either human or god), GISHIDA (aka, Ningishzida), GUGALANNA, GULA, GUSHKIN-BANDA, HAIA, HUMBABA, IGIGI, IMDUGUD, Pazusu, INANNA (aka, Innina), ISARA, ISHKUR, ISHTAR, ISHUM, KABTA, KI, KISHAR, KITTU, KULITTA, KULLA, KULULLU, KUSAG, KUR, LAHAR, LAHMU and LAHAMU, LAMA (aka, Lamassu), LAMASHTU, LAMASSU, LUGALBANDA, MAGILUM BOAT (aka, The Boat of the West), MAMMETUM (aka, Mamitu), MARDUK, Irra, MISHARU, MUMMU, Ea Mummu, MUSHDAMMA, Ninhursag, MUSHHUSHSHU, MYLITTA, NABU, NAMMU, NAMTAR, NANA, NANAJA, NANNA-SEUN, NANSHE, NEDU, NERGAL, NETI, NIDABA, NIN-AGAL, NINGAL, NINGISHZIDA (aka, Geshida), NINGIZZIA, NINHURSAG (aka, Belet-Ili, Damgalnunna, Nintu, Nintur, Mami and Mama), NIN-ILDU, NINKASI (aka, Ninkar), NINLIL (aka, Sud), Ninazu, NINSHAR, Enshar, NINSHUBUR, NINSUN, NINURTA (aka, Ishkur), NIRAH, NISSABA, NUSKU, PAPSUKKEL, PAZUZU, QUEEN OF THE NIGHT, Liltu, QUINGU (aka, Kingu), RAMMAN (aka, Rimmon, SAKKAN (aka, Sumuqan), SCORPION PEOPLE, SEBITTI, SHAMASH, SHARA, SHERIDA, SHULPAE, SHUTU, SIDURI, SILILI (aka, The Divine Mare), SIN (aka, Nannar), SUMUQAN (aka, Sakkan), SUMUGAN (aka, Shumugan), TABLETS OF DESTINY, TAMMUZ, TIAMAT, TIAMAT'S CREATURES, Musmahhu, Usumgallu, Basmu, Ugallu, Uridimmu, Girtablullu, Umu-Debrutu, Kusarikku, UMMANU, Enuma Elish, Edana, UMUNMUTAMKAG, URSHANABI, USMU (aka, Isimud), UTNAPISHTIM (aka, Ziusudra), UTTU, UTU (aka, Shamash), ZABABA, ZAKAR (aka, Zaqar), ZARPANIT (aka, Beltia), ZALTU, and ZU.

Our list of “god suspects” also includes the following GREEK GODS (from a list supplied by the WikiPagan http://pagan.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Deities ): Aphrodite, Apollo, Ares, Artemis, Athena, Demeter, Dionysus, Eris, Eos, Gaia, Hades, Hekate, Helios, Hephaestus, Hera, Hermes, Hestia, Pan, Poseidon, Selene, Uranus, and, of course, Zeus.

Then, there are the ROMAN GODS: Apollo, Ceres, Cupid, Diana, Janus, Juno, Jupiter, Maia, Mars, Mercury, Minerva, Neptune, Pluto, Plutus, Proserpina, Venus, Vesta, and Vulcan. Add to these the EGYPTIAN GODS: Anubis, The Aten, Atum, Bast, Bes, Geb, Hapi, Hathor, Heget, Horus, Imhotep, Isis, Khepry, Khnum, Maahes, Ma'at, Menhit, Mont, Naunet, Neith, Nephthys, Nut, Osiris, Ptah, Ra, Sekhmnet, Sobek, Set, Tefnut, and Thoth. Other AFRICAN GODS include: Obatala, Yemaya, Chango, Oshun, Elegua, Oya, Ogun, Babalu-Aye', Ochosi, and Osain. INCAN GODS include: Inti, Kon, Mama Cocha, Mama Quilla, Manco Capac, Pachacamac, Viracocha, and Zaramama. AZTEC GODS include Quetzalcoatl and Tlaloc. IRISH GODS include: Angus, Belenos, Brigid, Dana, Lugh, Dagda, Epona, Manannán mac Lir, and Kel. ANGLO-SAXON GODS include: Elves, Eostre, Frigg, Hretha, Saxnot, Shef, Thunor, Tir, Weyland, and Woden. NORSE GODS include: Asgard, Alfar, Balder, Beyla, Bil, Bragi, Byggvir, Dagr, Disir, Eir, Fenrir, Forseti, Freyja/Freya, Freyr, Frigga, Heimdall, Hel, Hoenir, Idunn, Jord, Lofn, Loki, Mani, Njord, Norns, Verdandi, Urd, Skuld, Nott, Odin, Ran, Saga, Sif, Siofn, Skadi, Snotra, Sol, Syn, Ull, Thor, Tyr, Var, Vali, Vidar, and Vor. LUSITANIAN GODS include: Endovelicus, Ataegina, and Runesocesius. ARMENIAN GODS include: Anahit, Astghik, and Vahagn. SLAVIC GODS include Belobog and Chernobog. Throw in AFRICAN GODS (Obatala, Yemaya, Chango, Oshun, Elegua, Oya, Ogun, Babalu-Aye', Ochosi, and Osain), plus deities of ORIENTAL MYSTERY RELIGIONS and IMPERIAL ROMAN CULTS (Attis, Cybele, El-Gabal, Mithras, Sol Invictus, and Endovelicus), and the URARTIAN GOD Haldi, and you already have a rather UNWIELDY GAME OF CLUE on your hands! But then, refer to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Celtic_deities for a list of nearly 300 additional CELTIC DEITIES! Finally, go to http://www.godchecker.com/pantheon/chinese-mythology.php?list-gods-names for a list of nearly 500 additional CHINESE DEITIES! Needless to say, our list in this blog is illustrative, but still not exhaustive.

Fortunately, for the Whodunnit question concerning the creation of the universe, we can pare down our list of substantial “god suspects” by eliminating those who are not mentioned as involved in creation or universe formation. The God of logic as we have previously argued is a God of creative logic. Only a “creator god” will fit the description. On page 50 of my book Disneology: Religious Rhetoric at Walt Disney World, I point out: “Virtually EVERY ANCIENT CULTURE offered explanations of our origins. The EGYPTIANS focused on the role of the Nile River in creation. They saw the beginning as a mass of chaotic waters, called Nu or Nun. To this beginning they added Sun, Moon, Earth, and Sky gods. The (immortal, but not eternal) Earth god and sky goddess eventually gave birth to Isis and Osiris, names better known to our generation, but Egyptian mythology (with such features as the Earth god lying on his side to form mountains) did not survive as a serious explanation of the beginnings of the world. According to an account of PHOENICIAN creation mythology dating at least as far back as the first century a.d., there was first chaos; then from a cosmic egg, creation of the universe began. MAYAN creation stories begin with sky and sea, and then the creation god Kukulkan (whose pyramid, incidentally, may be seen at the Mexico Pavilion in EPCOT) speaks the word ‘Earth,’ and the Earth rises from the sea. Following this, the thoughts of Kukulkan create mountains, trees, birds, jaguars, and snakes; finally, humans are created (first, out of mud; second, out of wood; third, as monkeys; and finally, as full-fledged humans). Vying with GENESIS as the oldest creation account is the BABYLONIAN creation myth. The Babylonian account we have is developed from SUMERIAN myths, in the 12th century b.c. According to this account, god/s did not exist at the beginning of the universe. Instead, sweet and bitter waters comingled and created many gods. Then, one god born of two others, Marduk, eventually defeated and killed the bitter waters, Tiamat, in a colossal struggle. Earth was created, followed by the moon, then the Sun. Finally, humans descended from the gods. GREEK creation mythology began with chaos, a watery state ruled by Oceanus, and as in the Babylonian account, reproductive activity on the part of the gods and goddesses produced the Greek gods. Poseidon, one of the great Greek gods (known by the ROMANS as Neptune), is featured in a fountain statue in the Italy exhibit in the ‘World Showcase’ at EPCOT.”

We may further reduce the number of possible “god suspects” who could be the God of Logic if we assume that the God who created the universe in a logical (LOGOS) fashion, and who is characterized by the ability to communicate (LOGOS), and who fashioned human beings with the capacity for using both types of LOGOS, and presumably, was therefore willing and motivated to communicate with them through LOGOS, would be a God who made himself or herself known to ancient cultures and would still be known to contemporary cultures. We may, therefore eliminate virtually all of the aforementioned gods and religions as “dead religions.” Turning then, only to CONTEMPORARILY VIABLE GODS, we may consider the following list: SHINTOISM and the JAPANESE GODS: Amaterasu, Susanoo, Tsukiyomi, Inari, Tengu, Izanami, Izanagi, The Shichifukujin, Daikoku, Ebisu, Benzaiten, Bishamonten, Fukurokuju, Jurojin, and Hotei. Shintoism is a modern-day religion for an estimated four million Japanese, but most Japanese only identify as Shintoist while not practicing any religious discipline in the religion. In China, BUDDHISM, while it is a spiritual exercise, is not considered to have any true “god” associated with it. HINDUISM, according to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindu_deities, is the “dominant religion of the Indian subcontinent.” It has no specified number of gods, but is popularly credited with having 330 million gods. To this list of ancient-but-contemporarily-viable-gods, it is necessary to add the ONE SINGLE GOD who is acknowledged as God by the world’s three major world religions—JUDAISM, CHRISTIANITY, and ISLAM. That one God recognized by all three of these religions is the God of Abraham.

From this list, we may eliminate Buddhism, since it has no “god” associated with it. We may eliminate Shintoism, since it now appears to be primarily just a cultural practice, not a strongly held religion. If the God of Logic (LOGOS) is defined as organizing all of the universe “logically,” we may also eliminate Hinduism, which seems to be a hodge-podge of deities from other cultures and individual preferences. Logically, then, we conclude—along with the world’s three greatest religions--that the God of Logic IS the God of Abraham. Whodunnit? Similar to solving the Game of Clue—that Colonel Mustard killed Mr. Boddy in the Kitchen with the Knife—we may conclude logically that “the God of Abraham created a Logical Universe and Logical Humans within that Logical Universe by means of the Agency of Communication/Spoken Word/LOGOS. If this is our conclusion, the next question becomes: “Which of the three major world religions best introduces us to the God of Abraham?” We’ll consider that in the next post.

Angels & Demons 14: Can Angels Rebel Against God?

While some Christians are familiar with the notion of angels marrying human women, and while that Fallen Angel Story is the most prevalent one in the period preceding the New Testament, most Christians are more inclined to link the fall of the angels to some rebellion of angels. Specifically, Lucifer in Isaiah 14:12-14 (who many Christians believe is Satan) is thought to have led an angel rebellion against God.

The motif of lesser gods rebelling against Zeus is the basis for the “Clash of the Titans” in Greek mythology. Therefore, the motif of angels rebelling against God made a good deal of sense to Jews who were living in the Greek Empire of Alexander the Great and his successors (between the Old and New Testaments). Furthermore, although the Isaiah 14 account has Lucifer “die like men” and be, thus, shown to be far inferior to God, many Christians view this Lucifer/Satan who led the supposed angelic rebellion against God to be almost equal to God in his strength and power. They believe that God and Lucifer/Satan are currently at war with one another, and some even believe it is possible that Lucifer/Satan will win. This motif of a Good God who is locked in struggle with an Evil God is neither Greek nor Jewish/Hebrew; it is Persian. (See Angels & Demons 4: “The Great Satan” of Iran.) Both the New Testament and Rabbinic Judaism from the New Testament period reject the view that angels can rebel against God.

Bereshit Rabbah 27:4, a passage to which I referred in an earlier commentary, presents evidence that angels were incapable of rebellion against God. There, in his exposition of Genesis 6:6 (in which God repented that He had made man), Rabbi Judah, from the second century A.D., quotes God as saying regarding MAN: “For behold, (if) I had created him from above, he would not have rebelled against Me.” The point of Rabbi Judah’s remark is that, if man had been created out of the same substance as heavenly beings, he would have been incapable of rebellion against God. Even if one accepts the view of Rabbi Nehemiah, also from the second century A.D., in the same Bereshit Rabbah passage, that if God had made man in Heaven, he would have caused the heavenly beings to rebel against God, one still finds the same basic conclusion: that heavenly beings have never rebelled against God. Otherwise, Rabbi Nehemiah would not have presented God as “relieved” that he had made man “on the earth.”

In Tanhuma Book I, page 30 (an account that parallels Bereshit Rabbah 27:4), the common term for “angels” is used instead of the term “heavenly beings.” Rabbi Judah is quoted as saying that angels do not sin. Rabbi Nehemiah says that God was consoled that He had not made man in heaven, because he would have caused the angels to rebel. Here, then, as in Bereshit Rabbah 27:4, angels remain non-rebellious.

The authoritative Judaic teaching of the period under consideration is in line with this Bereshit Rabbah passage. Angels did not rebel against God. However, we should hasten to add that this was not the position of the Church Fathers—those Christians who wrote in the centuries following the New Testament period. As I mentioned in an earlier commentary, in Justin’s Dialogue with Trypho a Jew, Dialogue 79, Trypho accuses Justin of blasphemy, because Justin says that angels sin and rebel against God. Here, it is clear that the Church Father taught that angels rebel, and it is equally clear that Judaism rejected that teaching.

The Jews of this Post-New Testament Period even REWROTE the Book of Enoch. The Hebrew Book of Enoch, written by various authors of this time, contains NO FALLEN REBEL ANGEL STORIES. It contains no account of rebellious fallen angels, such as the versions of the Book of Enoch written BETWEEN the Old and New Testaments do.

According to Bamberger (p. 94), “nowhere in Talmudic sources is Satan depicted as a rebel against God.” Neither is any account of Satan rebelling against God to be found in the New Testament. According to the New Testament, the account of Lucifer in Isaiah 14:12-14 is NOT TALKING ABOUT THE FALL OF SATAN. Lucifer is NOT SATAN. I will discuss Lucifer and who he is in my next commentary.

Angels & Demons 3: Where Have All the Fallen Angels Gone?

Although I never met him, Bernard Bamberger is the author of the most authoritative book from the late 20th century on Fallen Angels written from a Jewish perspective. I have a few things in common with him:

• Bamberger was the Rabbi of Temple Israel of Lafayette, Indiana, from 1929-1944; I was a member of the West Lafayette Christian Church that met temporarily in the Temple Israel building in West Lafayette from 1979 to 1981, when I was there.
• I had gleaned a great deal of information from Bamberger’s book throughout the 1970s, as I wrote my master’s thesis on Anamartetous Fallen Angels in partial fulfillment of my Master’s in Hebrew from Indiana University.
• Bamberger reached very nearly the same conclusions with regard to official Jewish literature that I reached with regard to New Testament literature as these literatures dealt with the issue of Fallen Angels.

Here is Bamberger’s conclusion from page 55 of his book: “The astounding thing is that, after some centuries of experimentation with this idea, the authoritative teachers of Judaism dropped it altogether. . . . The main line of Jewish thought returned to an uncompromising monotheism in which there was no room for satanic rebels.”

In the Old Testament, there were no fallen angels. Then, right after the Old Testament, hundreds of fallen angels emerged. Then, by the New Testament, the fallen angels have disappeared again! That’s amazing. In light of the flood of literature on fallen angels from the period between the Old and New Testaments, the obvious disqualification of the bulk of the fallen angel material from the official/codified scriptures of Judaism and the literature surrounding them is striking. The Hebrew Bible is silent on the subject and the official Jewish literature from the early Christian era is virtually silent on the subject. Furthermore, with the exception of a few very brief references to the story (which I shall explain in future commentaries) the New Testament is virtually silent on the subject. Where have all the fallen angels gone?

One possible explanation is as follows. Judaism did not get along with their Roman rulers in the years following Jesus’ death and resurrection, as they had gotten along with their Greek rulers in the early Greek Empire. They experienced a devastating seven year war with the Romans that included the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 a.d. Many Jews were taken into captivity; all of Israel was crushed by the Romans. It may well be that the increased tensions between the Jews and their Roman rulers provided the rationale for the abrupt discontinuation of many of these Hellenistic themes in Jewish angelology. In fact, it is interesting that the Church Fathers were the first to restore some of these Greek and Roman religious concepts of fallen angels. Christianity was fast becoming the new religion of the Roman Empire. There would be no real obligation on the part of the Church Fathers to divorce these western concepts from their theology. Rather, the opposite (attempts to show the reasonably close resemblance) would appear to be beneficial to the Church’s cause.

However, I think that early rabbinic Judaism and New Testament Christianity just became apprehensive about the dangers of Persian, Greek, and Roman religions and how these pagan religions had been instrumental in producing the fallen angel stories during the time Jews had been under the control of these cultures. Whatever the reason, the fallen angel stories are virtually gone by the time of the New Testament. We are hard-pressed to produce any material from the tannaitic-amoraic period of Judaism (the period just after the New Testament) or from the New Testament itself to support the Greek, Roman, or Persian themes in the fallen angel stories.

Since the Roman gods are, more often than not, just renamed Greek gods, I will not spend time discussing Roman religion. Next time, however, I will address Persian religion as it affected fallen angel stories. As we consider Greek and Persian religion, I think you will see how erroneous concepts of Satan and Fallen Angels developed, and how the New Testament and rabbinic Judaism countered these developments.