Thursday, September 9, 2010

The Case for God?


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Aired September 6, 2010 on BBC One
To mark Rosh Hashanah, Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks interviews four distinguished and engaging atheists in The Case For God?.

By having his own faith challenged by some of today's finest atheist minds, Lord Sacks attempts to get closer to what faith means. He interviews writer Howard Jacobson, who feels that religion is too bogged down by rules and regulations, while philosopher Alain de Botton does not believe any one religion can be the true faith". Scientist Colin Blakemore insists that science makes religion redundant, and professor Lisa Jardine maintains that human suffering undermines faith in God.

Will the Chief Rabbi find areas of common ground with these atheists and their issues with faith, and will it make him rethink his own beliefs?

23 comments:

  1. The video is still processing and should be available soon.

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  2. Stone your neigbours much rabbi? All religion is pick and choose, don't fool yourself

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  3. what's with all the relative bullshit??   couldn't BBC get someone to sit down and review the actual TEXT of what this guy stands behind to see if he can justify his SPECIFIC faith?  

    as Per relays above, it's great that he's such a hippy do no harm kind of dude, but the foundation of your belief is FAR from peaceful and understanding. 

    it seems that critical analysis is something the religious mind is completely incapable of (at least when it comes to the justification of their own beliefs).    

    AAAARRRGGHHH!  do you people really believe what you say you do?

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  4. Almost entirely nonsense. The first two interviews were just wastes of time. People talking past each other and the interviewees doing nothing to cut right through the inherent irrationality of religion (particularly the religion of the god of the Jewish Bible). The second guy seemed to want to just do all kinds of religious stuff 'cuz he likes rituals. Ok. Pointless to me and certainly not convincing.
    The thired guy was the only one to really cut into the nonsense, but by being too 'nice' about it.... failed to cut as deeply as he should have.
    By the time I got to the last lady talking about Hiroshima I lost interest. There was nothing of relevence to me in any of this as none of it was new or really insightful.

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  5. Let's not forget that Sachs is the guy responsible for comprehensively splitting British Jewry over the recent Jewish Free School fiasco that went to the Supreme Court (where Sachs thankfully lost).

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  6. Also, 'No', this 'Chief Rabbi' did not for one second 'question his own faith'. He was clearly trying over and over to get these people to accept as many pieces of his backwards ways and rituals and acted like he was making headway by pulling them in at least a little when he wasn't at all.
    He constantly acts like he has answers for these people who don't understand what he does.
    Again and without himself 'ever' confronting the irrationality of faith--a belief devoid of, or even counter to reason and evidence.
    Rationalists need to strike right at this heart every time. Faith is the opposite of reason. It's irrational by definition and is the best way to make a wild guess that's wrong whereas the Scientific Method is the the best way to attempt to find the truth.

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  7. THIS IS REDICUOUS! Seriously!? These were some of Briton's cleverest and most engaging critics of religion? Where was Richard Dawkins? I realize he's busy, but I'm sure he'd make room in his schedule to blast this guy's faith on national television. Rabbi Sacks has the audacity to meantion The Selfish Gene, but he refuses to have Dawkins on his show? It's just pathetic. I know a lot more was said than we saw, but either the people he interviewed had no idea how to challenge his faith, or this show was intentionally edited to make their positions seem weaker than they were. After five minutes I knew two things. That the Sacks had no intention of questioning his own faith, and that in reality he just wanted to take a shot at Atheism.

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  8. a series of lame, softball interviews with a bunch of weaksauce atheists. the rabbi's false bravado is painfully transparent. that's time wasted tgat i'll never get back

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  9. Where on earth did he dig up these Strawman Atheists? They sound exactly like what Theists think Atheists should sound like -- angry at god and bored with religion, but still hanging on to religious faith and rituals. It's like a talking Jewish Chick Tract.

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  10. I think the word you were looking for is "cowardly".

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  11. I liked this show actually. The Rabbi seems like a nice enough guy, and I admired how he challenged himself, put his own faith in the firing line. You don't see many other religious leaders doing that.

    But it was interesting how he craftily slipped his own faith around all the arguments presented to him. Wherever they threw their nets, he managed to wriggle out. I found myself face palming most of the way through it, but still - it was an enjoyable series of interviews. And the Rabbi reminds me of Deniro..and that can't be bad.

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  12. One can't "slip around his own faith", yet proclaim anything as gospally true. Faith, by definition, prohibits that. I wonder if this guy might re-examine his own beliefs after this 'crisis of faith'? I really don't imagine that he will, but one can hope right? It is all about faith, isn't it?

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  13. What is 'redicuous'?? Esp. confusing when you flip out in all CAPS about it. Really hurts the rest of your point for future reference. Some people won't even read what else you write after that.

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  14. As to the 'Where is Dawkins!?' demand... 1) the guy can't be everywhere and do everything. 2) he doesn't need to. There are lots of other capaple rationalist who could tear this rabbi's 'logic' apart. It's just not what these people were doing -
    cept the third guy somewhat softly/too nicely.

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  15. What's a Jewish Chick Tract?

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  16. Call Matt Dillahunty, them call me to watch.

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  17. The rabbi uses too many analogies. Has he heard of the false analogy fallacy, I wonder?

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  18. The rabbi uses too many analogies. Has he heard of the false analogy, I wonder? You can make analogies till the cows come home but they will still be weak premises when comparing something like novels and music to religion. I was not satisfied with either the atheists or the rabbi.

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  19. A waste of time.  The rabbi does really examine his own beilefs and his guests seem unwilling to engage him in a truly critcal way.  I found what he said to his last guest as the most over the top: god is not in crowds! Then who is!!

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  20. I like Allan de Botton but he was far to passive in the interview, he should have pointed out that the rabbi is just as guilty of picking and choosing as 99.99% of all religious believers are.

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  21. Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks: "When it comes to faith you have to take a risk, the risk of commitment. Religion isn't easy, nothing worthwhile is."
    Well, when you commit to faith, at the same moment you abandon reason, logic and rational thinking. So, in absence of those cognitive processes EVERYTHING is so damn hard. Especially something that doesn't make sense.

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  22. I'd have enjoyed watching Rabbi Sachs discuss the history of ancient Israel and biblical criticism with a scholar like Hugh Williamson from Oxford, or, if one wants fireworks, Philip Davies from Sheffield.

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