From Bondage to Liberty in Religion: A Spiritual Autobiography

by George T. Ashley

This flood story must be noticed a little closer. Noah is commanded to build an ark, as his family is chosen especially to preserve the race for a new start. He is also to save in pairs, male and female, specimens of every beast of the field, fowl of the air, and creeping things of all the earth to preserve the species. And now when the ark was ready, these beasts of the field, fowls of the air, and creeping things of all the earth, polar bears, moose, reindeer, and the thousand varieties of fur-bearing animals from the arctic north, together with those of the torrid deserts and jungles of the south, lions, tigers, hyenas, elephants, leopards, antelope, giraffes, ants, mice, hawks, doves, wolves, lambs, serpents of all varieties, of birds, beetles, flies, bugs and insects, all came of their own accord, in the exact number prescribed, quietly walked into the ark and lay down to rest until the deluge was over!

The deluge over, the new race started was as bad as ever. Even righteous Noah got drunk from the first crop of grapes he raised, and cursed one of his son's posterity to perpetual servitude. The race soon tried to outwit God by building a tower by which to reach heaven, and God's only way to prevent its success was to confuse their tongues so they could no longer work together, and the scheme had to be abandoned. The race grew continually worse, drifted into idolatry, and God resolved to try a new scheme to ultimately save the race. We come now to:

THE CALL OF ABRAHAM

Abraham is called to leave the land of his fathers, go to a new country and start a new race, through whom God would yet save the world, as all his previous efforts had proven failures. Here we have the beginning of the Jewish nation, whose history I have not space to even outline, much less to follow in detail. Study it for yourself in its fullness, because it has a vital relation to modern orthodoxy as now represented and taught in most of the churches. A few points, however, must be noted. The story tells us that the great God of the universe selects this one man, one family and one nation to be supremely blessed above all the balance of mankind, and to whom He committed his revelation and plans for their ultimate salvation, and denied these blessings to all the rest of his creatures. Could such a God be just? When the Israelites were trying to get out of Egypt, while Moses and Aaron were to go and beg Pharaoh to let them go, God is said to have hardened Pharaoh's heart not to do so, only to have an excuse to plague Egypt, kill the first born in every house and then overwhelm Pharaoh and his whole army in the Red Sea! Can a just God do that? When they finally arrive at the borders of the promised land they are commanded to literally exterminate the inhabitants and neighboring tribes, root and branch, men, women and children indiscriminately and unsparingly. God is described as resorting to lying, deceit and intrigue to lure the enemies of Israel to their destruction. Time fails me to pursue this horrible record in its details. It begins with Abraham and ends only with the close of the Old Testament Canon. Study it for yourself. Could a just God be guilty of such outrageous conduct? I think not.

As is well known, the doctrine is that God thus called Abraham and the Jewish nation apart from all the balance of the human race, that thru them He might ultimately send his son into the world to save the race from sin and hell. To this end promises and prophecies are said to point, thruout the entire Old Testament from Abraham to its close, and even as far back as the Garden of Eden and the first sin.

When Jesus of Nazareth appeared he was accepted by his followers as this promised Savior, the Messiah of promise and prophecy, and has been so accepted by the Christian world ever since. To him was attributed a miraculous birth as the Son of God; and in the opinion of his followers he was soon considered, not only the Son of God, but God Himself incarnated bodily in the son. In other words, that God Himself came down from heaven in the form of human flesh, to save the world by making an atoning sacrifice of Himself for the sins of humanity. And when Jesus came, suffered and died on the Cross, we are told that "the scheme of redemption was completed." And what is this "scheme" of redemption, or "plan" of salvation? This was the crucial point to me. I thought man was certainly a sinner and needed a Redeemer. I looked it over with scrutinizing care. Here is one God who is three Gods. A part of God left heaven, came to earth as a man, died on the Cross to satisfy the other part of himself for sins somebody else committed! I know this sounds to the orthodox like sacrilege, but I mean it seriously. Think of it for a moment! God dividing himself, one part in heaven, one part on earth and the third part, the Holy Ghost, a go-between! Boil it down to its last analysis and this is what it means. Either this, or three separate gods, one of whom comes to earth to die in order to appease the wrath of the other, the third remaining in heaven with the first until the second returns, when He would come to earth to continue the work begun by the second. There would thus be always two gods in heaven and one on earth. This is, in a nutshell, the sum and substance of Trinitarian orthodox Christianity.

We are told seriously that "there is no other name given under heaven, nor among men, whereby we may be saved except Jesus Christ." And that in order to be saved, we must believe in him as the only begotten Son of God, and in the atoning sacrifice of his death for our sins. Here I seriously inquired: If the salvation of the human race is entirely and exclusively dependent upon faith in the merits of the death of Jesus as an atoning sacrifice, what became of all the people who died before his coming? Orthodoxy answers that they were saved by faith in the Promised Savior to come, as given to Abraham, Moses, and the prophets. If so, how many were saved? The Jewish nation never looked for a spiritual Messiah. It was always a temporal one. There is no evidence that they ever had the remotest conception of a Messiah that was to make a vicarious atoning sacrifice of himself for them. Hence their faith in this promise was in vain. It was not the kind that saves, according to orthodoxy. An occasional prophet, like Isaiah or Jeremiah, or some others, might have so understood and believed it. But very few, if any, others did. Then the great mass of "God's chosen people" are now in hell; for they did not believe rightly; and all the balance of the world is there because they never heard of such a promise and hence did not believe at all!

But the question here arises, If salvation from Abraham to Christ was secured by faith in the promised Messiah to come; and which, as we have just seen, according to orthodox definitions, was practically a complete failure; how were they saved from the time of Adam until the promise made to Abraham?

The answer of orthodoxy is, By the promise made to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, that "the seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head." This is not the exact language of Genesis, but of the creed. The substance is correct. But according to Genesis this was not a promise to Adam and Eve at all; but a part of the curse pronounced on the serpent! There is nothing in the record to indicate that either Adam or Eve even heard it, or ever knew anything about it. There is nothing in the record to indicate that the serpent was present when God accosted Adam and Eve about their transgression. Besides, the incident is never referred to again in the whole Bible, by either prophet, priest, Christ or apostle. It is simply an example of that far-fetched method of interpretation I have before referred to, to establish a preconceived opinion and satisfy the demands of such a necessity. There is not a single line in the whole Bible to justify such an interpretation of this incident. The only possible cross reference that might indicate it is in Rom. xvi, 20: "And the God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly." And this can have no reference to the incident in Eden. Besides, if this sentence on the serpent was a promise of the victory of Christ over him, it was already accomplished before Paul wrote these words.

And if such a promise had been made, with the meaning attached to it that is claimed, God certainly knew that the race would soon forget it, and thus render it futile and give him additional excuse to vent his wrath and wreak his vengeance against his helpless creatures. If faith in such a promise was the only way of salvation from Adam to Abraham then practically all the world up to that time is now in hell! Who can believe such a caricature of God?