by Egregious

Created on: February 27, 2007   Last Updated: April 04, 2007

Why I'm Agnostic

I was not born into an agnostic family. I was born into a Jewish family. We were Reform Jews, so we didn't keep Kosher, we didn't regularly observe the Sabbath, and we similarly skirted numerous traditions observe by Conservative and/or Orthodox Jews. On the other hand, I underwent a bris at eight days of age, had a bar mitzvah at thirteen, and received at least a minimal religious education. After that, Mom and Dad left the decision up to me. It took me a very long time to make a choice.

Starting when I was in high school, I made a point of exposing myself to most of the world's major religions. I wasn't so much "shopping" for a religion, but I was doing a side-by-side comparison. At no time did I ever say to myself: "Maybe this will be the religion for me." It was simply a matter of surveying what's out there, which included non-religious philosophies as well as atheism, paganism, the beliefs of so-called "primitive" peoples, etc. All of these systems had good things to offer, but they all had what I felt were glaring (and often obvious) errors.

The biggest problem I have with organized religions is the fact that they are created by people, transmitted by people, and accepted, lock, stock, and barrel, by people. Well, I'm a person, no better or worse than anyone else. If someone else can invent a cosmology - whether it includes deities or not - so can I.

Devising a new cosmology is not as difficult as you might think. Here's the first "chapter" of a "scripture" that I pulled out of thin air:

The Book of Bunk

Chapter I
1. The Creator of our universe is not supreme. The Creator is to us as we are to fictional characters.

2. The Creator also has a Creator. And that Creator has a Creator. And so on.

3. What is the nature of the supreme Creator, the first one in the chain? Well, no Creator is any different from any other. The first one in the chain has a Creator, just like all the others; its Creator is the ultimate, or last one in the chain. The chain forms a loop, in other words. We occupy one link in that loop of chain.

4. The universe and our place in it are nothing more than an elaborate daydream in the mind of the Creator.

5. Why is the world the way the world is? Who's to say? Daydreams don't have to make sense.

6. How did the universe begin? It doesn't matter. What matters is the here and now.

See how easy it is? Are these ideas any more absurd than God creating the universe in seven days? That story was also written down by a mere human being, just

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